


Something to Be Earned

by Evilsnowswan



Series: Bad Girls [2]
Category: Supergirl (TV 2015)
Genre: Accidental Voyeurism, Alternate Universe - BDSM, Corporal Punishment, Dom Andrea, Dom/sub, F/F, Light BDSM, Spanking, Sub Lena Luthor, Voyeurism
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-10-14
Updated: 2021-03-04
Packaged: 2021-03-09 03:27:59
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 12
Words: 50,023
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27008092
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Evilsnowswan/pseuds/Evilsnowswan
Summary: Early season 5. Betrayed by the people she thought were her friends, Lena is devastated. She is spiraling and making all the wrong decisions— until someone from her past steps in, steps up, and offers to catch her.RojasCorp AU. It’s kinky. Eventual SuperRojasCorp.
Relationships: Kara Danvers/Lena Luthor, Kara Danvers/Lena Luthor/Andrea Rojas, Lena Luthor/Andrea Rojas
Series: Bad Girls [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1971139
Comments: 306
Kudos: 334





	1. Rescue (Prologue)

**Author's Note:**

> This is a continuation of [ Who Doesn't Love a Bad Girl](https://archiveofourown.org/works/25087945). That was supposed to stay a one-shot, but some pearl-clutching anon had me reconsider, so here we are. Please check the tags. 
> 
> _Who Doesn't Love a Bad Girl_ is included as Chapter 1 (Prologue) for your reading convenience.

Flying over the city at night, on her way home, Kara listens—not for police sirens, fire trucks, or ambulances; she’s tired and just wants to go back to bed. The city can handle itself for the rest of the night, surely—but for the people who are near and dear to her. Listening to their hearts beat, checking in to make sure everyone she loves is safe and sound before she turns in for the night—it’s like reading her favorite book before bed. It calms her and helps her sleep.

So, hovering in mid-air, high above the sleepless lights of National City, she closes her eyes and feels for them, one by one, ticking them off on the list in her mind. As she does, she can feel her body relax and her heart slow down—that is until there’s only one name left on her list: Lena.

Things between them are… _complicated_. But some hopelessly stubborn part of her refuses to let go of their friendship; refuses to believe there’s no coming back for them from all this. It’s a small part and growing smaller with every day, every new low blow, but it’s there: spitting and clawing, fighting for survival with a fierceness that has Kara listen for Lena, even when her chest is tight and it’s hard to breathe around the lump in her throat.

It takes her maybe half a second to realize something isn’t right. Lena’s heartbeat is loud—much louder than it should be, given her distance to Cordova Street—and it’s erratic, racing, stuttering, stumbling over itself. Her own heart hammering in her chest, Kara speeds off at once, all thought driven clear from her mind at the distress signal. She’ll be damned if she’ll let her get hurt. No matter what.

“You know that’s what happens, little girl. Bad girls get punished.”

Just outside L-Corp, at Lena’s balcony, Kara stops short. Her eyes are seeing… _things_ , her brain scrambling to make sense of it all and failing.

There’s Lena’s office with the lights still on as usual, and there’s Lena, but she’s not sitting at her desk—not technically, anyway—instead someone else is, with Lena… with Lena draped over their lap, head low and hands and feet barely touching the ground.

“You thought, I’d let you get away with it, hmm?” When she recognizes the voice and the face, Kara nearly drops a few feet in the air, only just catching herself in time before she actually does, a funny feeling in her belly. It’s… it’s her new boss, Andrea Rojas, with a wicked smirk on her face as she brushes Lena’s hair away from her neck, her fingers dancing on Lena’s skin and making her shudder. “Did you?” 

“No.”

“What’s that?”

“No, ma’am.”

“Better.” Andrea’s hand is on Lena’s… _skirt_ , rubbing lazy circles, and Kara’s face is on fire. “No, little girl. No, I don’t think I can.”

 _What_ —?!

Kara doesn’t know what to do—not with her eyes or hands or… in general. She still doesn’t understand, but what she _gets_ is that she probably shouldn’t be out here—and not _in there_ either.

“Color, Lena?”

There’s a beat. Lena inhales sharply, and Kara’s neck prickles.

“Gree—”

And with that and without warning, Andrea’s hand lands on the seat of Lena’s skirt, hitting the right side of her bottom with a firm smack.

Lena gasps, jerking forward—a gasp of pain or surprise and probably both that sends a tiny jolt through Kara—but Andrea’s other hand is keeping her in place, taking hold of her hip and pulling her closer against her. Lena’s heart is beating out of her chest, her breathing ragged and loud—oh, so loud—in Kara’s ears, and Kara has to keep herself from coming to the rescue, trembling fists clenched at her sides.

“You shouldn’t underestimate me, Lena,” Andrea says, bringing her hand down again, striking her left bum cheek. “Do you really think that I don’t know when someone’s trying to steal from me?”

A steady, rhythmic stream of spanks follows the question, alternating from side to side, and Lena squeals, reaching back desperately with her hand in vain attempt to protect herself. “Ow! Andrea, I—”

“Caught trying to steal my technology? How embarrassing for you. What will your shareholders think? Or the world?” It only takes Andrea a second to catch that hand and pin it to the small of Lena’s back, and the punishment for her crimes—crimes that hearing about doesn’t surprise Kara nearly as much as she wishes it did— the punishment continues unabated. “You know, I really thought more of you, Lena.”

Lena whines, and Kara feels hot shame trickling down her own spine, uncomfortable and sticky, recalling a time when Astra had—just that once—put her over her knees. But _this_ isn’t that, exactly, and yet Lena is experiencing the same embarrassment, the same shame and guilt, Kara is sure of it, her head bent and face flushed.

 _Well, good_ , Kara thinks, taking herself by surprise at the thought. _Maybe someone should make her see reason_.

“Oh, and I ran diagnostics before you... shattered _my_ lenses. I know how valuable they are to you, how many hours you spend in them—” Andrea continues in steady rhythm, covering Lena’s upended bottom with hard slaps as Lena drums the toes of her heels against the floor and rocks back and forth, fighting to keep nearly completely quiet. “Whatever _are_ you doing in there?”

Lena grits her teeth, and Kara can practically feel the storm brewing in her chest. She struggles to maintain her composure, but Kara sees the tears forming in the corners of her eyes and hears the little cries that escape from her lips in time with the next spanks.

“You’re cut off, you won’t get another pair from me,” Andrea states, pausing, and Lena slumps with relief, then struggles to rise off her knees. Andrea presses her left elbow hard against her back, forcing her back down. “Not so fast. Where do you think you’re going?”

“Ugh, fine, whatever. Come on, Andrea!” Lena struggles against the hold, but she must know it’s futile. Kara does. That’s an iron grip and Lena has no way of breaking it. “Please, let me up.”

Andrea snorts. “That’s cute.” Moving her hand down Lena’s backside, she takes hold of the hem of her skirt and begins to draw it steadily upwards. In doing so, Kara catches her first glimpse of the evidence of just how hard Andrea’s hand has come down on the top of Lena’s thighs already, and her mouth runs dry as she averts her gaze.

_She shouldn’t, should she?_

“We're only, maybe, halfway through, honey,” Andrea says, delivering two more loud slaps that ring in Kara’s ears. As she lifts her gaze again, she catches Andrea’s smirk and for a second her heart stops, certain she has been spotted, discovered floating far too close for far too long, but then Andrea’s attention is on Lena again, and Kara is sure it’s just her own nerves playing tricks on her.

Andrea leans in and whispers something in Lena’s ear that Kara, still gathering her bearings, doesn’t catch, but that has Lena launch an immediate protest, twisting her body to escape the other woman’s grasp whilst shooting her free arm back in an attempt to push her skirt back down. “Andrea! No, don’t! ... Stop! I don’t want—”

Kara can’t help but be amazed at her fierce resistance. Where has it come from?

“Don’t keep screwing with me,” Andrea growls, the sound hitting Kara square in the chest and making her own heart quiver and jump into her throat. Andrea delivers two sharp slaps squarely on the back of Lena’s exposed thighs, drawing two equally sharp squeals from Lena, and pushes her firmly back into position. “De acuerdo, _reinita_ , hora de hablar.”

Her r’s are rothic, her accent thick, glomming onto Kara’s skin and crawling into every pore, making her suit cling to her body even tighter and her breath come out in a hot puff, visible in the cool night air. 

“What have you been up to in _my_ VR, Lena?”

As humiliating as it has to be to have to speak with her head down and her bottom up in the air, Lena answers almost immediately. “Nothing.”

Andrea clucks her tongue.

“It’s none of your business, Andrea!”

Despite her protests, Lena’s skirt continues its upward rise until it’s bunched at her waist. She is wearing a pretty pair of dark blue panties, thin and snug, with an inset panel of light blue lace at the back—wide at the waistband, but narrowing into a pretty point at her bottom cheeks.

“Is that so?” Andrea runs her fingertips lightly over the lace, then resumes the spanking, smacking a struggling Lena hard and fast over her panties. Color is coming up quickly on the skin not covered by the flimsy underwear, and Kara can tell by Lena’s cries that she is feeling it. “We’ll see about that, won’t we, little girl?”

With a defiant grunt, Lena kicks her legs up in an effort to shake away the pain.

“Legs down!” Andrea commands. As soon as Lena has obeyed, she delivers two hard blows across Lena’s thighs just under her panties, creating instant streaks of red across her soft white skin.

Shushing Lena, Andrea keeps going until it’s clear that she has given up trying to wriggle off her lap.

“ _Ahora_ ,” Kara watches, petrified, as Andrea releases Lena’s arm and pauses just long enough to slip her fingers into the waistband of her panties, pulling them down quickly to reveal her bottom in one smooth movement. “Obsidian Platinum. What aren’t you telling me, Lena? No one at L-Corp seems to have seen you in weeks, and it’s not like you to neglect your responsibilities.”

Lena pleads, then wails, hands flying to her face, so she can hide behind them, and Kara feels something akin to pity and sympathy for her former best friend tug at her heartstrings.

“A little bird told me, you’ve been holed up in that hidden lab of yours.” Andrea looks down at her firm, round bottom for a moment, admiring the lush reds and pinks, before she raises her hand once more and covers it in a dozen or so firm smacks, moving her hand so that every inch receives its fair share. “I know you, Lena. What are you up to?” 

Lena is crying hard now, sobbing into her hands.

Andrea delivers a series of—unmistakably—painful slaps to the same spots; the tender skin right where bottom meets thigh. It _has to_ be building a bad burn, judging from the way it makes Lena wail and wiggle, unable to endure the proceedings with any semblance of composure any longer and trying to move away from the merciless hand, but Andrea doesn’t let her escape, finishing off with half a dozen more unrelenting slaps.

“Whatever it is, Lena. It stops now, you hear me!”

“Yes… yes!” Lena scrambles wildly, head thrown back with her next cry. She is choking through her sobs and tears, and, repositioning, Andrea pauses to let her catch her breath, letting her palm rest on Lena’s bottom—which has turned a deep red color, reminding Kara of the apple tree in the garden back home in the fall.

“Oooh! … Please— _please_ ,” Lena struggles for breath, trying to bring her hands back, but stopping herself halfway there, grasping the chair instead. “Please, I’ve… had enough. Please stop!”

Andrea looks pensive for a moment, hand ghosting over Lena’s skin and making her shiver. “I think,” she says slowly, drawing out her words like deadly bubblegum, ready to pop. “I think, I’ll be the judge of that— and I believe we aren’t there yet.” 

Kara swallows hard against her heart stuck in her throat. She can almost taste Lena’s panic—even when she knows that to be impossible—and the humiliation burns hot in her own abdomen, stirring up its own kind of turmoil inside of her.

The next slap catches Lena on the back of her thighs, just above the knees. “Andrea!” Lena struggles once again to rise off Andrea’s lap, but before she can gain an inch, Andrea has resumed with unimpressed vigor.

Lena yelps and wails, arching her back, her words unintelligible nonsense, slurred by tears and snot.

Two more loud blows falling on already well-punished flesh have to be going through Lena like burning bullets. For another minute or two, her flaming red bottom is covered with good, solid spanks, while she kicks and struggles, until she goes completely limp over Andrea’s lap, her face burning nearly as red as her thighs and bottom.

“Will you be a good girl now?”

Andrea stops, waiting for a reaction that doesn’t come, and surveys the scene, visibly satisfied at the sight of Lena’s raised skirt, her panties on the floor, her deep red bottom across the dark material of her pants, and Lena, who remains in place, sobbing in submission over her knee.

Something tugs at Kara then, dark and feral, warring with the protective instinct lodged in her chest and winning out, as she heaves a heavy breath. There’s something very appealing about Lena like this, spent and pliable, clutching Andrea’s pant leg in one hand and the chair support with the other, letting her tears fall freely, and Kara has to resist the temptation to fly in there, scoop her up, and tenderly kiss her burning cheeks.

“Alright, up with you now.”

Her chest goes tight with longing as Andrea strokes Lena’s back gently. She puts her hand on her shoulder, guides her upright, and checks her tear-streaked face, brushing at a streak of black mascara on her cheek with her thumb before she pulls her into her lap, bringing her close, and lets her finish her cry in her arms, with her head resting against her chest.

“Shhh, Lenita, shh.”

Lena slowly calms down and eventually stops crying, but her body still heaves, and, whispering into her hair, Andrea wraps her arms tighter around her and kisses the crown of her head. “I got you, _corazón_. I got you.”


	2. An Offer

Lena sleeps. For the first time in months, she sleeps through the night. She sleeps on her belly for most of it—which isn’t exactly comfortable—and her arms feel a little numb when she wakes up in the morning, her face buried in her pillow. She hasn’t dreamt about her brother. Or about Kara. And, maybe, she just doesn’t remember dreaming, but, either way, it is a relief.

The novelty of uninterrupted sleep has her a little confused and her brain foggy. Yawning, she turns onto her back, then hisses through her teeth as last night's events are brought sharply to the forefront of her mind.

Lena feels her face heat up, and she covers it with her hands, dragging them down over tired, warm skin as she blows out a long breath. Right. There is that. Andrea in her office, the two of them going toe-to-toe over something stupid, and her ending up over Andrea’s knee.

If it weren’t for the tender reminder on her body, she would think it all a crazy fever dream. It isn’t. And she’s not entirely sure how that happened. Andrea is back. She has brought her here, yes. She is the one who reached out— in the name of smart business decisions, but still. It feels surreal.

Lena bites her lip, throws back the covers, and gets out of bed.

Despite the good night’s rest, she can’t think without coffee in her system. And there’s some serious thinking on her agenda for the day. Her life is a collage of messes and blunders and stupid decisions, and she needs to start fixing what she can, before it all comes tumbling down and traps her beneath the rubble.

She hasn’t been doing a good job. There’s no explaining that away.

She is a mess.

But, at least today, her head feels almost like it’s been screwed on right for a change. She can see things for what they are, and will have to make a game plan before everything goes back to shit. She’s good at that— making plans, writing lists, and sticking to them.

“Good morning, Miss Luthor,” Hope greets her, and the lights above the kitchen island switch on. “Your coffee will be ready in 3 minutes and 45 seconds. Would you like me to list your breakfast options?”

“Thank you, Hope. How are we on milk?” Lena eyes the stools for a moment, then decides to remain standing, her elbows resting on the cool glass as she turns on her laptop. She can wait for four minutes. Thank goodness, she has decided on the ‘fastest home coffee maker in America’, and the Velocity brewer has yet to disappoint her. It can pump out a full carafe in just under four minutes. 

“Ordering milk now,” Hope chirps, and Lena sighs. The small screen on the fridge lights up again. “Ordering eggs, butter, cream, fruit selection, vegetable selection—”

Okay, so there is nothing in her fridge. Nothing nutritious, anyway. Maybe some booze. An expired cup of yoghurt. She knows this, and yet, the back of Lena’s neck prickles as shame and guilt burn red-hot in her stomach.

“Hope, stock fridge, please.” Her heart thumps extra loud as she gives the command. She should have done this sooner. It’s not hard.

“Stocking fridge,” Hope confirms. “Your order will arrive in 5 hours and 43 minutes. Leave a note with Frank?”

Frank. Her building’s full-time doorman. When has she talked to him last? When has she seen him last? Lena doesn’t recall, and the uncomfortable heat in her belly coils a little tighter.

“Yes, leave a note and a tip, please.”

“Yes, Miss Luthor.”

The coffee maker beeps, and she pours herself a cup, carefully taking a sip of the dark liquid as she looks around the room.

“Open blinds,” she says, and Hope obliges, the blinds drawing up steadily and revealing the sky dipping its toes into the new morning. The sun is tinting the horizon a warmer hue, streaks of soft orange breaking through the bluish-black, and Lena watches, her mind blissfully blank.

She finishes her coffee slowly, relishing in the bitter taste and the soft light on her face, then decides to go and take a shower.

Lena puts her head beneath the water, drowning out all sound but that of her own heartbeat.

The hot water feels so good on her tight shoulders and the back of her neck. She doesn’t care that it stings against her skin, turning it bright red. She turns the water up as hot as possible without boiling herself alive. She turns it up, as if the sting against her skin will somehow erase the sting of her conscience. She knows that even the best intentions are no excuse for bad decisions or wrong actions; and the heat, however pleasant, fails to make her forget that simple fact, reminding her of her personal shortcomings and failures instead.

The heat makes her skin hum, amplifying the echoes of Andrea’s touch—every slap, every clap, every hard smack—a tingling reminder of where her hand has been and why.

Eyes closed, Lena can almost still feel her, can almost still smell her perfume. She has worked so hard to keep the thought of Andrea from her mind. Trained herself not to flinch at the mention of her name or at the taste of scotch on her tongue. And now?

Now, here she is again. Here she is, everywhere, and Lena aches.

She turns the hot water off for about thirty seconds, letting the suddenly cold stream wake her up and stop all her thoughts dead in their tracks.

Shivering, she steps out in a cloud of mist and grabs a towel, rubbing herself down so roughly that it leaves her skin an even brighter shade of red. She holds her breath as the soft material touches bruised skin, and looks at herself in the bathroom mirror, but it’s so fogged up, she can only just make out the shape of her face, dark hair, and green eyes.

Wrapping the large white towel securely around herself, she turns on the hairdryer and gives her hair a quick dry, leaving it slightly damp as she wanders back into her bedroom. She needs to select something to wear, which, in theory, shouldn't be a problem, but when one is confronted with about three dozen beautiful options, that’s more than enough to overwhelm a person.

Sitting on her bed, her protesting backside cushioned by fluffy cotton, she stares at her wardrobe, then turns her head and glares at herself in the folding three-way mirror. She can make and sign off on multi-million-dollar-deals, but, heaven forbid, she has to decide what to wear, or what kind of chocolate to buy, on one of her bad days. And, in spite of a decent start, she feels today has rather great potential to become one of those still.

“Miss Luthor.” Hope’s voice startles her so bad, her shoulders fly up painfully. “A package has just arrived for you.”

Part of her—the part that thinks her quarterly assassination attempt is overdue, and wouldn’t mind getting blown up, or whatever—wants to skip security protocol and just take her chances, but, honestly, she doesn’t want to see the tabloid headlines the next morning, if she goes and lets herself get blown up for real, poisoned, or otherwise attacked while wearing nothing but a bath towel. It would make for a very… juicy crime scene, which is tempting, but no. No, thank you. 

“Initiate protocol, Hope.”

It takes a couple minutes, then Hope’s tinny voice fills her bedroom again. “No threat detected, Miss Luthor.”

Great. Such a shame.

Since there is zero chance she is going to pick an outfit and get dressed within the next ten minutes, Lena just exits the bedroom, and pads over to her front door. She hasn’t ordered anything other than food, and isn’t expecting gifts of any kind to be delivered. If this is another delivery of potstickers and a letter from Kara, she thinks, cracking open her door just wide enough to check for unwanted visitors coming with whatever has been dropped off on her doorstep, she is going to dump all of it in the trash.

She might be hungry, but she isn’t that hungry.

It’s not Kara, and it’s not potstickers. It’s an unassuming box inside a bag, and Lena gently pulls it inside before closing the door again. Not light. But not that heavy either. Lifting the bag, she carries it to her bedroom, drops it on the bed, and sits down next to it, a funny feeling in her belly.

“Okay,” she says, half talking to herself and half to the strange delivery sitting on her duvet. “Let’s see what kind of creature you are, shall we?”

The moment she has the box slide from the bag, and the lid comes off in the movement, Lena no longer has to ask.

Within seconds, her bedroom is berries and vanilla and the softest musk, and her heart is in her throat, making it difficult to get any air in or out as she chokes on nothing.

 _La Cautiva_ , the captive, is everywhere; trapping her in an onslaught of memories and upside-down emotions, and Lena’s head swims as she blinks away tears, grimacing a little as her fingers touch soft, expensive fabric.

Inside the box is a dress—dark green and gorgeous—and it’s engulfed in that fuzzy scent that’s about to drive her off a cliff. She knows that scent; she knows it so intimately well that it hurts her heart and pierces her lungs on every shaky inhale.

Her fingertips trail over the dress before she carefully lifts it from the box. She doesn’t have to check to know it’s her size, and there’s a pair of shoes and a bag to go with it.

Stifling a sob and feeling herself tremble, Lena clutches the dress to her chest, then buries her face in the familiar scent. It welcomes her with open arms, fluffy and comforting in a cashmere sweater type of way, and she has to draw back before she ruins everything, the storm in her chest threatening to become sudden cloudburst— if she allows it to.

She’s just being sentimental.

No, she is losing her mind.

Letting go of the dress and setting it aside to investigate further, Lena finds a pair of black heels and an understated clutch— which don’t come as a surprise.

However, there’s something else in there too. A cream-colored envelope and a narrow jewelry case. While the dress and the shoes and the bag are all brand new, the case is slightly battered, and Lena swallows hard as she gently picks it up and sets it down beside her.

Inside the envelope is a note. Plain white. Black ink. A date, a time, and a place on it.

 _Today, 11:30 a.m., CatCo_.

That’s it.

Lena doesn’t open the case immediately. She doesn’t have to. She gets up—nerves and restless energy getting the better of her—but her hands are shaking so hard, she drops the note, and her knees are so weak, she just leaves it lying right there on her bedroom floor, and sinks back down onto her bed.

She knows what this is. It’s a question; it’s an offer; it’s a _possibility_.

And—story of her life—Lena doesn’t know what she wants.

She has options, she reminds herself.

One: Everything goes back in the box and is returned to sender. Two: She keeps the dress and the shoes and the bag, but ignores everything else. Or three: She puts on the dress, slips her feet into the shoes, fixes her hair and make-up to go with the outfit, and shows up at CatCo for lunch.

And, even if she goes with door number three, there’s another fork in her road: She can either accept or tell Andrea to go to hell— right to her pretty face.

Lena wipes away her tears. The flutter in her stomach isn’t only from nerves. Part of her wishes, she had more time—to think things through, to come to a sound decision—but Andrea knows her too well. She knows she can’t let her overthink, and overthink she would.

Lena would drive herself mad, meticulously weighing her options, and weighing them again and again, until the simple thought of having any options at all would paralyze her, and render her utterly useless.

No, the clock is ticking, and Lena feels the adrenaline rush through her, warm on her neck and in her cheeks as her heart dances to the beat of an almost forgotten song. A song she has carefully put in a tiny box. A box, taped shut and kicked to the darkest corner of her mind.

Andrea is throwing her a line. Lena knows it. And, maybe, just maybe, it is what she wants; what she has hoped for all along.

Biting her lip, she stands and drops her towel, the white cotton pooling at her feet before she steps out of it, and moves to stand in front of the mirror. Eyes narrowed, she studies every inch of skin, every freckle, every pore—as if the blush in her cheeks or the bruises on her ass are holding all the answers she is so desperately looking for. Her skin pebbles as she grows cold, and Lena sighs, half contemplating another shower and settling for nice underwear from the top drawer instead. It won’t keep her warm, but it will conceal the worst of her bruises.

If she is milk, Andrea is marble. And she really does bruise easily.

She knows Andrea wouldn’t treat her badly, not ever. She would respect her boundaries. She would keep her safe.

Lena hasn’t felt safe in so long.

She takes a deep breath before she reaches for the narrow case, and holds it in until she is sure she will burst. There it is. The necklace. A choker made of supple leather, three thin straps with silver rivets, with a small pendant that fits snugly into the hollow of her throat, right between her collarbones. A small teardrop locket, engraved silver.

She doesn’t open it, doesn’t touch it, just sets the case back down, and picks up the dress instead. She gets to her feet, opens the zipper, and steps into it, pulling the velvety garment all the way up and twisting her body to reach the zipper to close. The dress fits her like a second skin, and Lena would be surprised, if she didn’t know better.

The shoes are much the same— a perfect fit, and much more comfortable than they look.

Lena draws in a long breath, letting her hands travel over her body and watching her reflection in the mirror. She is thinking soft curls and dark lipstick. A touch of mascara and, possibly, blush— though, at this point, that might be overkill.

Deliberately striding across the room in a quick march, she hears her new heels click on the wood, then soften on the rugs. She likes how they sound, and likes how they feel too, and her back is already straighter and her head held higher than they were only yesterday.

Gingerly sitting down at her vanity, she curls her hair—gently, not too much heat or product—and applies her favorite lipstick and mascara.

When she is finally happy with the results, it’s already 10:30, and her head is light and swirling as she jumps to her feet. She should really have eaten something. It’s too late for breakfast now, and, if she doesn’t hurry, she is going to be late for lunch too.

She puts on the choker, fastens the delicate clasps at the nape of her neck with trembling fingers, and tries to calm the wild beat of her heart as she catches her own eye in the mirror. She can think about it more in the car. She can take it off again, if she so chooses. But, right now isn’t the time for indecisiveness or second-guessing.

Lena is still dizzy, and feeling slightly delirious with the preposterousness of the whole situation, when she climbs out of the car, walks to the elevators, and rides up to CatCo.

She steps out into the familiar bullpen. It’s humming and buzzing with activity this morning, and she smiles and nods politely at familiar faces in passing—all the while sending quick prayers to the universe to, please, have _Supergirl_ be busy elsewhere.

Not wanting to take her chances—the universe doesn’t like her very much—she quickly and purposefully strides over to the office that, not too long ago, had been her own.

The glass door is still there, but a lot has changed in the few weeks since Andrea’s arrival. Different furniture, long curtains, dark swirly wallpaper, and a large minimalist painting in a heavy golden frame. Cool colors. It’s all very… Andrea. Not _Andrea_ , Andrea, but detached, distant, professional Andrea.

Refraining from licking her lips, Lena knocks on the door, and waits for Andrea to look up from her work and tell her to come in, before her clammy hand presses down on the handle, and pushes it open.

“Lena. What a pleasure to see you again.” Andrea looks pleased as she pushes to a stand behind her desk, and her eyes widen a little as she lets them roam over every inch of her. When she finally smiles at Lena, her smile is warm and inviting, but also slightly predatory, and Lena feels a jolt of high-voltage go through her at the sight. “Please.” Andrea gestures to one of the plush chairs in front of her desk. “Take a seat.”

Lena’s heart struggles violently in her throat, thrumming against warm leather and making the silver pendant quiver against her skin. Her heels click on the floor, the sound merging with the frantic beating of her heart in her ears as she walks, and Lena pauses after a few steps, unsure whether she wants to keep going or turn on her heels and bolt.

“I’m glad you came.” Andrea’s voice is steady and confident, and oddly reassuring, and Lena feels herself relax a little.

She can still go. She can still say no. But, maybe, just maybe, she could also say yes. She can definitely hear Andrea out, can’t she?

“Let’s talk,” Andrea says, smiling when Lena settles into the proffered chair and, after some uncomfortable shifting and shuffling, pulls up one leg to sit on it. “And eat. I’ve ordered Italian. How does that sound?”

She takes a deep breath, feels the armrest’s soft material under her fingers. And there’s that familiar scent again, sweet and fruity, as Andrea leans forward on her desk, trying to catch her eye.

“Perfect.” Lena nods, wrapping a curl around her finger and playing with it. It is a nervous habit, a remnant of the girl that once was, and Lena doesn’t like it, but she also can’t not do it. Not right now.

Andrea gives her a sharp look. “I hope you didn’t skip breakfast, Lena—” Lena swallows hard— “It might still be a minute until the food actually gets here.”

Oh, damn it, she knows her too well. Lena opens her mouth, closes it again, shakes her head, then nods— and Andrea lets out a little, lenient laugh, before she rests her chin on her hands and studies her for a long moment.

“Alright. We can talk about that later,” she says, a vein of steel creeping into her voice that has Lena’s ears grow hot. “First things first.”


	3. New Rules

She has barely slept. Her thoughts have kept her up all night. She hasn’t actually thought most of them, but not thinking them, making sure she wouldn’t, has taken up all the willpower and energy that’s usually going towards powering down and getting some rest, so Kara hasn’t gotten any.

Of course, she is at work regardless. New leadership, amongst other things, is making it difficult enough for her to duck out and attend to super-emergencies when she has to. She can’t afford to use up an excuse to take the morning off. She also has work to do, actual assignments to write, contacts to see, research to do. Yesterday’s DEO time means she has to work extra hard today to keep up with her current load; and she won’t risk William butting in and stealing one of her stories while she is looking the other way. She won’t let him steal her thunder.

Speaking of thunder, Miss Rojas certainly is in a mood this morning, and Kara makes sure to keep out of her way as much as possible. Nobody has cried yet, but her two assistants (she has _two_ ) have that frantic look about them, as they rush to and from the office, that tells her it’s just a matter of time. Miss Rojas doesn’t yell, she isn’t cruel, but, from the little time she has worked under her new boss, Kara has already deduced that she doesn’t tolerate sloppy work or insubordination. Andrea Rojas knows what she wants, and how and when she wants it, and, even when she doesn’t agree with Miss Rojas’ ‘vision’ for CatCo or her take on journalism, Kara can respect that.

Right now, Miss Rojas is in her office, typing rapid fire behind closed doors, and the rest of CatCo is sharing a collective exhale, everyone breathing for a minute. Some courageous souls even venture out of their seats for a mid-morning snack or a cup of coffee. Kara isn’t in the mood for either, and she hasn’t got the time anyway. She has a deadline to meet, an article that’s supposed to be polished and proofed, and on Miss Rojas’ desk right after lunch.

Lost in her work, Kara isn’t paying attention, and, when her head snaps up and her senses catch up with her surroundings, it’s already too late. Kara can hear Lena arriving, hear her heart beat like her favorite song played all wrong, mere seconds before the elevator dings open; and, unable to flee anywhere without being spotted, she’s left with no choice but to duck and cover, hiding under her desk like a complete moron.

She’s just… not ready to face Lena. Not unannounced and unprepared. Not after the past months. And certainly not after last night.

Pretending to be looking for something, something small and non-existent on the floor—just in case anyone has witnessed her graceless, impromptu dive and is still watching—Kara stays on her hands and knees, feeling herself jitter from nerves, her palms sweaty and heat rushing to her face.

Lena can’t be here. She hasn’t processed anything yet, and, merciful Gods, why is Lena looking like that?— And why does it suddenly bother her?

Lena has dressed to impress ever since they met. Kara has seen the skirts and the suits, the dresses and the heels. She’s been here to witness plunging necklines and off-the-shoulder everythings, seen fabric slip down pale skin or pull taut over perfect curves, and it’s never been an issue. It really hasn’t.

However, from her position on the floor, Lena’s heels are as high as her dress is short, and Kara can’t help but let her eyes travel in awe: up and down, and up again. Against her better judgement, they linger— and Kara tells herself it’s only because something about this outfit is off.

It certainly isn’t because her eyes have seen something they shouldn’t. 

Lena’s dress is just the right color. The soft curls bouncing against her shoulders and back are really pretty and complimenting it nicely.

So, maybe, it isn’t the dress and it isn’t the hair; but something _is_ different, something has _changed_ , and Kara frowns when she can’t pinpoint exactly what that is. The necklace—for want of a better word—no, the _choker_ around Lena’s neck certainly is new and different, but that is not it either. Maybe, Kara thinks, listening to Lena’s clicking footsteps, it has nothing to do with how Lena _looks_ and everything with the way she _walks_ , the way she carries herself across the bullpen.

Peeking around her desk, watching Lena knock on Miss Rojas’ door and wait with her hands clasped tightly in front of her body, Kara licks her lips. She can almost taste the right words to describe what she means on the tip of her tongue; can almost give a name to that glowing gut-feeling that has her squirm and sit back on her heels with her next exhale. Whatever it is about Lena; about the _thing_ that’s radiating from her in high-frequency waves that have the hair on her neck stand straight all at once, it is doing a number on her, and Kara finds her mouth is suddenly much too dry to speak anyway.

Lena steps into Miss Rojas’ office and closes the door behind her, and Kara’s knees are protesting her position, her legs starting to itch from prolonged contact to scratchy carpet, but she doesn’t dare move, doesn’t dare resurface just yet. Maybe, if she pretends to be looking for her lost… sanity a minute longer, her breathing will calm down and the heat in her cheeks will simmer down enough for her to pass it off as nothing.

She is being ridiculous. It is just Lena. Lena in Miss Rojas’ office. And why wouldn’t she be?

As Kara contemplates getting to her feet and sitting back down at her desk, she feels someone’s gaze on her and turns her head to find Nia shooting her a quizzical look as she approaches.

“What are you doing?”

Kara scrambles to her feet, feeling the tips of her ears burn as she brushes lint off her dress.

“Lost something,” she mumbles, looking just past Nia’s left ear. “My… my earring.” Touching her own earlobe, she clears her throat and taps the stud earring that has been piercing her skin the entire time. “Found it. Yeah. So.”

Nia tilts her head, but doesn’t say anything, and Kara is very grateful for that.

“Can I—? Do you need something?”

“Your contact at the bank,” Nia says at once. “They are reliable, aren’t they?”

“Absolutely. Wait—” She rummages for a sticky note and a pencil, and quickly writes the details down before holding them out to Nia. “Here you go. Tell them I said hi.”

“Awesome. Thanks.”

Nia hovers by her desk for a moment longer, shifting her weight from one leg to the other. Normally, Kara would inquire further, ask what story she is working on that requires the inside-scoop on National City’s banking activities, but Miss Rojas chooses that very moment to let out a peal of laughter, her head thrown back and golden brown hair cascading down her back, and Kara’s attention is diverted elsewhere.

“Uh, I’ll just… lunch at Noonan’s in a bit?”

Cursing glass for its tempting transparency, Kara tears her gaze away with a herculean effort and looks at Nia, forcing her face into a smile. “Yeah, definitely.” She nods at her monitor. “I’ll better buckle down to this first though.”

“Right.” Nia smiles back, but her eyes are watchful, and Kara avoids looking into them for too long. “I’ll let you… work then.”

She pats Kara’s desk and turns to go, and Kara’s head turns with the force of a magnet being pulled towards another.

She shouldn’t look. It is none of her business, and she really has all of this work to do, but with every second longer her chances of focusing on anything other than what her eyes are currently riveted on become slimmer and slimmer.

They are still talking. Miss Rojas doesn’t take her eyes off Lena for even a second, and the pit in Kara’s stomach catches fire, flames licking up into her chest. By the time her mind has caught up with the sensation and is trying to snuff it out, her pencil is already in two splintered pieces on her desk.

Kara swallows and wipes her palm on her thigh.

She doesn’t understand what exactly is bothering her about this, but her gut-feeling has yet to be wrong when it comes to protecting Lena, and so Kara does something she would not normally do: she takes a deep breath, closes her eyes, and listens. 

“Are you ready for it?” Miss Rojas’ sonorous voice fills her ears, and Kara feels a warm shiver run down her spine. 

“Yes,” Lena says, her answer low but firm. “Yes, ma’am.”

“Are you quite sure? I won’t go easy on you.” The warning undertone has the nape of her neck prickle, and Kara opens her eyes to sneak a look, catching the way Lena shifts in her seat. 

“I don’t expect you to. And I am,” she says.

Miss Rojas leans back in her chair, her blue eyes diamond-sharp and trained on Lena. “Very well then.”

“Just—” Lena’s voice quivers, almost imperceptibly. Kara can’t see her face, but she can picture her expression. “One thing.”

“I’m listening.”

“We… We keep it private?” Lena’s voice is barely above a whisper, and Kara brings it closer to her ear, ignoring the way her cheeks flood with warmth.

“Hmm, _dale_. Haven’t we always?” Every word dripping from Miss Rojas’ full lips is warm honey, as she leans forward on her desk. She smiles at Lena. “And, since we are on the subject of rules—” Her fingernails drum out a quick rhythm on a binder, before she picks it up and holds it out for Lena to take. Lena actually has to leave her seat to do so, but she sits back down immediately after, her legs tucked under her body and the binder resting in her lap, untouched.

“Open it,” Miss Rojas instructs, and Kara hears the rustle of plastic and paper, the soft scrape of Lena’s nimble fingers against whatever that binder holds, as she turns the pages.

Kara wants to believe this is business. She wants to believe those papers are about CatCo, Obsidian North, or L-Corp. She really wants to believe they are emails, excel spreadsheets, and colorful pie charts; Submissions to facilitate the decision-making process in whatever deal the two women are negotiating, but, no matter how hard she tries, she can’t shake the strong conviction that whatever is going on is anything but business-related.

“As you can see,” Miss Rojas says. “Nothing much has changed on my end.” With a little jerk of her head, she flips her hair back over her shoulder. “Take a moment and read it all through carefully. I want you to know exactly what it is you’re agreeing to, Lena.” She gets to her feet, rounds the desk, and hands Lena a pen, before leaning against the front. “Feel free to make adjustments or add to the list as needed.”

Lena takes the pen, but Miss Rojas’ words are met with silence, and Kara catches the displeased frown on her face before it dissolves into a slightly more palatable expression. Looking down at Lena, she shakes her head and sucks her teeth.

Lena’s head snaps up, and Kara can almost feel the same jolt tingle in her own spine.

“Che, _reinita_ , ¡pórtate bien!”

“Thank you,” Lena says as an afterthought, covering her dominant hand with the other, resting both on top of the page she has been reading. She braids her fingers together. “Sorry, I… I didn’t—” Still looking up at Miss Rojas, she pauses and takes a little breath, and Kara picks up on the audible uptick in heartbeats. “I’m sorry. Yes, I will do as you ask, ma’am.”

All meek and appeasing, she doesn’t sound like Lena at all, but, at the same time, she _does_ , and Kara doesn’t know what to make of that— or of the sudden pressure that’s travelling down her body and settling at the apex of her thighs, pulsing at low frequency.

Miss Rojas crouches down to be eye-level with Lena and tips her chin up. “Wherever are your manners, hmm, Lena? I want you to mind them, understood?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“Atta girl.” Her knuckles brush Lena’s cheek, and Kara rubs her thighs together under the table. “Take your time going over everything,” she says, straightening. “If you need more respite—”

“I think I should be just fine right here, ma’am,” Lena says slowly, meeting her gaze, and Miss Rojas smiles down at her like an over-saturated sunset, unmistakably pleased with Lena’s answer and whatever she’s finding on her face. Kara… doesn’t like it all that much.

“Alright.” Miss Rojas’ hand squeezes Lena’s shoulder in passing. “You do that. I will be right back. Going to check on that lunch order.” She lets her fingers trail down Lena’s back. “It’s high time we get a proper meal into you.”

Lena ducks her head. “Thank you, ma’am.”

Well, Kara can agree with that. Lena has always been on the slim and willowy side, but Kara hasn’t missed how she seems to have shrunk—almost alarmingly so—since her brother’s death. And, since she’s no longer welcome at L-Corp with Big Belly Burger lunches or fried sugary treats from Noonan’s anytime of the day, Lena has probably gone back to her unhealthy habit of skipping meals altogether.

So, if she can’t make sure Lena eats regularly anymore, at least someone else is, Kara thinks, feeling something akin to deep gratitude radiating off her as her boss walks briskly past her desk— no doubt, in search of whichever assistant has been put in charge of getting her and Lena lunch today. She follows Miss Rojas with her eyes, watching her hips swing fiery figure-eights as she blazes across the bullpen.

Blowing out her cheeks to dispel both some of the tension and the color burning right under her skin, Kara looks at the open document on her monitor screen. The blinking cursor glares back at her reproachfully, reminding her of all the unproductive seconds that have already ticked by, and her stomach twists in a bout of panic. Sure, she’s done her job for a few years now, won a Pulitzer for it even, and hasn’t really felt like this since the days she used to fetch coffee for Miss Grant on a daily basis, but, be all that as it may, she is definitely behind, and stressed about it— and also, somehow, very sure, Miss Rojas won’t appreciate waiting. She probably doesn’t accept late assignments at all.

Feeling some strange kinship with her former best friend, Kara glances over at Lena in her boss’s office. Lena hasn’t moved. She is still curled up in that chair, studiously bent over whatever is in that folder that Miss Rojas has given her, reading and scribbling notes in the margins.

Watching Lena, Kara’s heart expands with something soft and warm, only to squeeze sharp pain into her veins the very next second.

Kara sighs. She really needs to finish this assignment.

Tearing her eyes away from Lena and sitting up straight, she adjusts her trademark glasses, rolls her shoulders and neck, shakes out her arms, and, finally, gets back to work.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Quick side note: Andrea is bilingual, so there'll be the occasional code-switching happening in this fic, but I'll try to keep it to a minimum/readable amount and provide explanations/translations wherever needed. Please, keep in mind that Spanish is my 4th language (that I haven't used in years). I'm trying my best and, if you're a native speaker (or just know better) and spot a mistake, please be a sweetheart and let a confused multilingual know in the comments, okay?
> 
> So,  
>  **Andrea <> English** in this chapter:
> 
>   * _dale_ (≈ vale): form of agreement, but can have many different meanings. Here: yes, sure, okay.
>   * _“Che, reinita, ¡pórtate bien!”_ : "Hey, [little queen/princess], behave!"
> 



	4. Sanctuary

There aren’t any surprises on Andrea’s list. It is long and it is detailed, but Lena is already familiar with Andrea’s absolute no-goes, maybes, and the things she likes and expects. Even so, she still considers each item very carefully. Some of them she underlines, some she crosses off, some get a question mark or a comment in the margins. It doesn’t take long. Lena is nothing if not efficient.

Sitting with her back to the bullpen, and with the office door closed, she can neither see nor hear the people of CatCo going about their usual business on the other side of the glass. She has no way of knowing whether curious eyes are swinging her way every now and again or not, but she imagines they do.

The thought doesn’t make her blush, and neither do the typed words she reads— even when some of them are, in fact, very intriguing.

In her new, tailored armor and with Andrea’s perfume lingering in the room like a reassuring caress, Lena is the picture of professionalism, unfazed and calm. Even if part of her rejects everything about this… arrangement, finds it revolting even, another—much bigger and much louder—part is more than ready, more than sure about the path she finds herself on. It is well-trodden, and sometimes the right way forward is to go back.

She reaches the end of the list, frowns, and adds some more question marks and a comment, then looks up.

Andrea isn’t back yet.

Lena leaves the binder on her desk, runs her fingertips over the cool glass. She knows Andrea would not object if she asked for more time. Time to go over the terms of their agreement one more time, time to prepare herself. But then, the rules haven’t really changed, and neither will her mind. She knows she is safe. Andrea may be a rich girl, but she isn’t old money, and she treats all her possessions with meticulous care.

“Finished already?”

Andrea’s question hits her ears, and Lena turns without thinking about it. Her eyes find Andrea’s pleased smile, bounce off the take-out boxes in her arms, and catch another pair of eyes behind her. Eyes that hasten to look away, pretend that they haven’t been looking in the first place— and Lena doesn’t know how that makes her feel.

Well, she certainly feels something—hot and hard, like a slap in the face—and, whatever it is, Andrea—ever-perceptive Andrea—clocks it at once, her smile giving way to a small frown and a slightly furrowed brow as she sets their lunch down on the first available surface—the armchair Lena has vacated mere moments ago—and takes another decisive step towards her. 

Lena still isn’t sure what she feels exactly or why her chest goes tight like it does, but from Andrea’s shifting expression and the way her shoulders tense before she purses her lips and turns around—turns on her heels, turns her whole body to block whatever or whoever is responsible for what she’s reading on Lena’s face like it is an open book— Lena knows Andrea doesn’t like it.

Lena doesn’t move.

She just stands there, somewhere between Andrea and her stylish glass desk, looking at Andrea’s ruler-straight back and the warm golden brown waves that break on her shoulder blades.

If Kara is the open ocean—raw blue and recondite— Andrea is her rock, her calm in the storm, her safe harbour. And, perhaps, it is wrong to seek shelter from the storm now, wrong and cowardly, but Lena is so tired of trying to stay afloat by nothing but her own efforts.

She wants to go to her, wrap her arms around Andrea, and bury her face in her soft hair until her world shrinks to nothing but blackcurrants and vanilla.

“Lena—”

Andrea has turned back to her, and Lena can’t see Kara anymore, but her hands are shaking and her knees are weak, and she takes a step back, leaning against Andrea’s desk before her legs can give out from under her.

She knew Kara might be here. Two-faced, super-powered alien or not, CatCo is still her place of work. She just needs a moment to pull herself together. 

“Lenita?”

The softly-spoken term of endearment catches her attention. Andrea doesn’t use it all that often, not unless Lena is at her most vulnerable and needs Andrea to catch her before she falls.

“What’s wrong?” There’s a crinkle between Andrea’s eyes now. A crinkle, not unlike the one that used to make Lena smile so many times. At the same time, this is nothing like that. This one is etched in deeper somehow; pretty, even with the scar that’s breaking it. Pretty, but not cute. “Lena, if you’re having second thoughts, if you want to talk about it—”

Lena’s mouth is dry. She shakes her head. “No, it’s not—” She glances down at the binder. “That.” Her fingers curl around the edge of the desk. “It’s… it’s nothing, really. I just—”

Andrea’s eyes dart to the binder, then back to her face, pinning Lena in place and making the back of her neck prickle with foreboding.

“Lena,” she says, her voice deep and firm. “Don’t lie to me.”

Lying, or rather not-lying is one of their cardinal rules. This whole thing between them doesn’t work, _they_ don’t work, if one of them isn’t honest.

A single lie won't void their agreement, not like a blatant disregard for the other’s boundaries would, for instance, but Lena knows it will get her in trouble. The honesty-rule is so important that, if she breaks it deliberately, there are dire consequences.

“I’m not, I…” She falters under stern gunmetal blue. “Please, Andrea. Not now, not… here?”

Careful not to let her gaze stray outside of it again, Lena looks around Andrea’s office a little helplessly, hoping to convey just _how much_ she can’t talk about it while Kryptonian eyes and ears might be watching and, quite possibly, also listening in to their conversation.

She has no intention of telling Andrea about all that, of course not, she won’t stoop that low, but she has to tell her something. And she can’t do it here.

Andrea’s watchful eyes are tracking her, parsing her words for all she isn’t saying, and Lena swears she could pinpoint the exact moment Andrea comes to a conclusion and makes a decision.

“Okay,” she says. “¡Vamos!”

She scoops up the containers, shifts them to one arm like a skilled waitress, and holds out a hand for Lena to take. She could simply have told her to come along or grabbed her, and Lena would have let her. But this way she gets to choose, and Lena chooses to slip her trembling hand in Andrea’s waiting one.

Andrea’s touch is warm and sure as they cross the bullpen and head down the winding staircase. CatCo, Obsidian— They are turning heads. Maybe it isn’t the hand-holding, but just the fact of who they are. Maybe it is a little bit of both.

Their heels click on the marble floors, finding a beautiful rhythm and maintaining it with ease.

Andrea’s Obsidian office is less spacious than the one upstairs, but also more private, and, while Lena knows Andrea appreciates an audience at the right times, she is very grateful that they won’t have one here.

“Let’s try this.” With a smile, Andrea opens the door and leads her inside. “Over here. Let’s sit.” There is a desk in the room, but she motions her to an armchair in a more cozy-looking corner with a low table centered on an expensive rug.

They sit, and Andrea clears the table and sets out the food between them. Bigoli in salsa, salad, and crisp ciabatta. The pasta is still steaming hot and smells delicious.

“We'll talk after I get some food into you,” Andrea states, handing her a fork and a spoon. “Some color in your cheeks, some life—” She sighs, shakes her head, and gets up to fiddle with the thermostat, and Lena yearns for long sleeves to pull them down over her cold hands.

“Ah! Y ahora… ¡Buen provecho!”

“¡Provecho!,” Lena echoes softly. Her eyes travel over the colorful salad before she lifts her gaze to meet Andrea’s across the table.

They eat in comfortable silence. Lena has to keep from moaning at the different textures and rich flavors in her mouth. The nutty flavor of bigoli pairs well with the anchovies, the tomatoes are fresh and juicy, and the hint of onions, basil, and olive is almost too much for her taste buds.

Andrea’s lip curls into a knowing smirk, and Lena feels her cheeks burn so fiercely her gaze drops to her pasta, and her hands still for a moment.

Lena doesn’t enjoy eating. Eating is an inconvenience, an unwanted interruption of her busy schedule at best. She is aware she has to eat, to fuel her body, but it’s nothing especially pleasurable. There are things she likes more than others, of course, but mostly, her diet is one of convenience. Things that can be easily grabbed on the go, swallowed between thoughts without interrupting them. Soft things, bland things.

Andrea, on the other hand, is neither of those two. She is heat, she is spice, she is color and texture, captivating all her senses.

“Look at you,” Andrea coos, her warm hand covering Lena’s. “Much better.”

Lena looks up and feels her heart swell at the soft look in Andrea’s eyes. Then it cracks, and Lena inhales sharply. Great, she’s back in her life for all of five minutes, and Andrea is already worrying about her. When has her life—when has _she_ —become such a mess?

“Thank you,” she says. “For lunch and, well, ...” She doesn’t have to say it, they both know what she means. But just when she wants to swallow the words, they go the other way. “I really needed last night.”

“I know,” Andrea agrees. There’s no judgement, just confirmation. “What I _don’t_ know—”

“You heard about… my brother?”

Andrea nods. If anyone understands, it is probably Andrea.

The rest of it— _all of it_ —burns right under Lena’s skin, and she longs to tear at the seams and let everything spill out into the open. She _wants_ to tell Andrea everything. But, no matter what Kara did to her, her secret isn’t Lena’s to tell. And she can’t explain herself fully without that key detail, so she’s at a mental impasse.

“Things just… kind of unraveled from there.” Close enough, and yet miles away. “Someone—” Much, much too close— “ _Something_ happened when... after Lex… died.” She takes a breath; all the things she’s omitting rattling around in her brain. Like how her best friend of almost three years, the friend she had had a hopeless crush on for most of that time, betrayed her trust. Or how she pulled the trigger, but her brother was the one to fire the deadly shot.

The memories, crisp and sharp, leave a funny taste in her mouth. She won’t take another bite of her lunch.

“That’s why you sold CatCo,” Andrea ventures.

She isn’t wrong. In fact, she doesn’t even know how right she is. She’s so close to the red-hot truth of it all, the warning bells at the back of Lena’s mind are going off all at once. If she can’t tell Andrea _everything_ , she needs to keep her mouth shut. Change the subject.

“It’s… complicated.”

“I can do complicated.” Andrea leans back in her seat, dabs at the corners of her mouth with her napkin without ruining her lipstick. Bold red, like always. “I just need to know that you’re here because you want to be.”

Lena feels like crying. Tears of relief, maybe. Or gratitude. “I am,” she says softly. “And I do. Want to be here. Do this.”

Now that she’s here, Lena doesn’t want Andrea to ever leave again. Now that they are talking, she doesn’t want to stop. Now that it’s real again, so real she can almost grab it with both hands, there isn’t a single doubt in her mind.

“Are you absolutely sure? If you want to back out, now is the time to do so.”

“But what about… us?”

“I’m sure we would find another way to stay in each other's lives. We were friends first.”

Lena bites her lip, and for a moment, she wonders at the lack of temptation Andrea’s offer holds for her. She has offered her an out without a catch. She has offered her to leave this office with both her dignity and their friendship intact. She has offered to go only as far as Lena is comfortable going. And, while Lena values friendship more highly than the average person, and while the memories of their friendship are mostly fond ones, she doesn’t want to go that far back. No, she wants to go all the way forward. She wants to jump.

“You jump, I jump, Lena. Always. You know that, right?”

Lena knows. And Andrea knows the kind of magic she is evoking by saying those words out loud.

She nods, but Andrea is still waiting. Waiting for more.

And perhaps it is this, Andrea’s persistence, her absolute need to make sure that Lena consents to their agreement whole-heartedly or not at all, that has Lena lift her chin, meet her eyes, and smile.

“I am sure.”

Andrea tilts her head, considers her for a long moment, then smiles back. She looks happy.

“Did you like your present?” she asks, something igniting in her eyes, and Lena’s hand flies up to touch the locket, warm from her skin. She fiddles with it, bites her lip. “Me re gusta ese vestido.” Andrea plays with her hair lazily, her eyes never leaving Lena’s.

The statement is innocent enough, but the gaze that’s roaming over Lena’s body is not. Andrea might like that dress on her, but she would like to take it off even more.

Lena licks her lips. “It’s beautiful. Thank you, ma’am.”

Her answer pleases her, and Andrea laughs softly. She runs her thumb over her full bottom lip, and Lena’s heart does a funny little hop-skip. “Good girl, minding your manners.”

Lena feels herself blush.

They pick up right where they left off, effortlessly, seamlessly. It is strangely beautiful. And it takes her breath away, the look on Andrea’s face and the easy praise squeezing her heart so hard it is spluttering in her chest. 

Lena is feeling warm, even when her hands are still cold and she can’t properly feel her feet. She tucks some of her hair behind her ear and picks her fork back up—mostly to give her hands something to do that isn’t fidgeting in her lap. More tomato ends up in her mouth, some cucumber, an olive.

“Walk me through the rest of your day, bomboncito?”

“Um,” Lena swallows, pauses to think. “At two, I have a board meeting for the hospital. At three-thirty, I'm supposed to meet with the committee for the fund-raiser for the community pool. I wish I hadn't agreed to be the chair of that thing.” She makes a face, thinking of the sharp sting of chlorine in her nose and the repulsive humidity of indoor pools. “Depending on how that goes, I’m hoping to get some time to run back to the lab and finish what I didn’t get done yesterday. Even without—” She catches herself before she mentions Obsidian and the lenses, or what she’s done to her pair and the tech inside it before Andrea put a stop to it last night. “Anyway, some wriggle room. Then a conference call with… Envision Energy and NEC Corp about the batteries for—”

Andrea holds up a hand to stop her. “Impressive. What do you pay that sweet assistant of yours for, anyway?” She laughs, before her expression changes and she asks, “And for dinner?” — as if it is a matter just as important as L-Corp securing a lucrative deal with Shanghai and Tokyo.

Lena groans internally. They have just finished lunch, and Andrea wants her to think about dinner. Dinner time is still hours away—very busy and important hours—and, quite frankly, with all the neglected work piling up on her desk and waiting for her in the lab, and with the conference call that’s scheduled for seven-thirty and probably going to take up most of her evening—

“ _Reinita_ … ” It’s not a strong reprimand yet, just a warning, but it comes with raised eyebrows and is followed by a stern look that has Lena squirm a little in her seat.

Her back teeth grind on the urge to subvert. She might need structure to be productive and rules to remind her not to work herself into the ground while riding the high, but that doesn’t mean Lena likes it. She’s kind of allergic to people telling her what to do, how to live her life. She’d rather stew in her own indecisiveness for days or lose sleep over a tricky problem. She knows it’s not the healthiest mindset. And she also knows Andrea won’t let her get away with it.

She shrugs, crosses her arms over her chest, and looks up to find Andrea watching her like a hawk. She needs to lose the silly attitude and come up with an acceptable answer. It’s just dinner. It shouldn’t be hard.

Lena lets out a deep sigh, wracking her brains for passable dinner options that won’t interfere with her work too much, but her grey matter is a wasteland. Tumbleweeds and dust. Cheddar on toast and a muesli bar won’t fly with Andrea.

“Sushi or Thai?”

Lena blinks. Cold, dead fish or curry and coconut on rice? She doesn’t really care either way.

“Sushi?” She finds Andrea’s eyes, searching them for approval. She doesn’t know why or how, but the woman has the patience of a saint. “Sushi,” she says again, a little more conviction in her voice this time.

Andrea leans forward and holds out her hand, open palm. “Phone.”

Lena doesn’t ask, just digs it out of her clutch and places it in Andrea’s waiting hand. When she gets it back, her schedule has been altered to include a dinner meeting with Andrea and a cryptic entry that won’t make much sense to poor Jess, but is perfectly clear to her.

“If you can’t negotiate a good deal in three and a half hours,” Andrea says, catching her expression. “It’s time to call it a night. Reconsider, reschedule. Eleven pm sharp, Lena.”

She has asked her to butt in, sure, but right now Lena isn’t so sure anymore that was a good idea. Andrea knows how life as the head of a Fortune 500 company can be, which is both a blessing and a curse. She isn’t unreasonable. But, unlike Lena, Andrea is, and will always be, unwilling to compromise on basic needs such as proper nutrition or sufficient sleep.

“Fine,” Lena grumbles. “But—” There is no ‘buts’ with Andrea, so she just lets the rest of her feeble protest die with her next exhale. There’s no point. “Yes, ma’am.”

“Wonderful. And, Lena?” Andrea’s grin grows wider, becomes a little wolfish. “Only good girls reap rewards.”

Lena squeezes her eyes shut for a moment, screwing up her face and making Andrea laugh. She swears there’s only one strand of DNA separating her from Pavlov’s dog sometimes— and Andrea sure knows how to ring her bell. 

“I know,” she mutters, and crosses her legs. 

Yes, she does know. And, like a kid set loose in the proverbial candy store, who is told not to stick their hands in all the jars with colorful, tasty treats (and then goes ahead and does just that anyway), Lena is pretty damn sure that the effort of keeping her hands off what no longer belongs to her is, indeed, going to destroy all her hopes of striking a good deal tonight. 

Instead of focusing on batteries and energy management software, her mind is bound to wander, to explore more exciting, forbidden places. If she can’t break the rules, she can at least imagine Andrea dispensing some very special rewards. And the best, most lucrative business deal can’t hold a candle to Andrea in the bedroom.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **Andrea <> English** in this chapter:
> 
>   * _“¡Vamos!”_ — “Let’s go!” 
>   * _“¡Buen provecho!”_ : phrase, meaning bon appétit, enjoy your meal 
>   * _“Me re gusta ese vestido.”_ — “I _really_ like that dress.” 
>   * _Bomboncito_ : Diminutive of bombón (a chocolate), term of endearment. Like sweetie. 
> 



	5. Troublemaker

She is a patient person. She has learned to be. Today, however, everyone seems to be hell-bent on testing her patience, stretching it dangerously thin. She’s the ringmaster and CatCo is her circus, and Andrea is this close to cracking her whip and making the animals behave. Her two top reporters are acting like preschoolers, one of her PAs is out sick and the other has messed up her schedule, and, as a result, her last meeting ran so late, she hasn’t even had time for lunch.

Her eyes glued to her tablet, Andrea nibbles on her cookie. She doesn’t do cookies, normally; doesn’t have a drawer full of sugary snacks or a candy jar on her desk, but these cookies are an exception. Her papá has sent them. He knows they are her favorite, and, after the morning she’s had, Andrea’s dwindling willpower isn’t enough to resist the siren call of classic alfajores (filled with dulce de leche and rolled in shredded coconut).

She lets the last bite of her cookie melt in her mouth, then sucks all traces of sugar and coconut off her thumb. Looking up, she finds wide blue eyes watching her.

“Kara.”

“Uh, I— sorry to interrupt, Miss Rojas, um—”

Andrea opens her mouth to school the other woman about manners, about knocking on doors and waiting for an answer like a civilized human being, but then decides not to. Instead, she puts her elbows on her desk, leans forward, and her hair falls forward over her shoulders.

“Is there something I can do for you?” she asks, a brilliant smile on her lips— bright and sharp, and hitting its mark.

“I, uh—” Kara stammers, stumbling over the sounds as she makes them. For a Pulitzer Prize-winning reporter, she sure struggles with words a lot. “This... is about the water tax piece.”

“Yes.” Andrea licks her lips, not missing how Kara’s eyes dart to the movement. “Your piece on the governor's proposed water tax. What about it?”

“He says… You asked William to rewrite it?”

“I did.”

Kara’s jaw works, her shoulders tense. Andrea can read her body language like a newsfeed updating in real-time. “Miss Rojas,” she says, her voice controlled, but her hands giving her agitation away. “Cutting out facts, not disclosing every side—”

“Kara, if you're having trouble with the style I'm looking for—”

“You can’t just take a thoroughly researched, balanced story and turn it into clickbait tabloid stock!”

“Actually, I can.” Andrea raises both eyebrows and her chin, giving her employee a couple seconds to backtrack and adjust her tone and volume, but Kara doesn’t. She steps closer, her hands hovering inches from the desk for a beat before she touches down and puts her weight on them, leaning in and invading Andrea’s space.

Power move. Okay then.

“Kara. Need I remind you you’re on a brand-new, three-year contract?” Andrea asks sweetly. “I’d hate to have to exercise your non-compete clause?”

Kara scoffs, and Andrea almost grins. Kara’s heart bleeds for this job. She won’t risk it.

“Oh. So, if I quit, you’ll block me from the whole profession,” she says, her voice pitching to that of a bratty teenager.

Andrea doesn’t do bratty. It gives her a headache.

“Do you wish to find out?” She keeps her voice cool, smooths her brow, and leans back in her chair, running her hands along the edge of her desk slowly without breaking eye contact. 

“I’m not quitting,” Kara mutters, and something flickers in her baby-blue eyes. “But I will fight you— every time, on every story, if I have to, to make sure it gets told the way it deserves. I won’t let you… take over and… hurt… this publication; turn it into something it is not, just because you can. Just because _Lena_ thinks—”

Oh? From strongly-worded notice of resignation to shovel talk in under ten seconds. Interesting. Unexpected, but not entirely surprising.

Andrea pulls back her shoulders, rolls her neck from side to side, and takes a deep breath, studying Kara closely as she speaks. “Kara. I have no intention of hurting… CatCo. In fact, I’m going to take what’s already brilliant and sharpen it until it’s deadly. I want CatCo to grow, to tap that dormant potential. To survive, to shine, it needs to pivot. You just have to trust that I know what I am doing, because… I do.”

Kara opens her mouth, but Andrea holds up a finger. “You’re welcome to disagree, of course, but don’t forget who signs your paychecks. CatCo is mine and that means I get to call the shots, whether you like it or not.”

Kara steps back, crossing her arms over her chest. “Well, I will try to be shorter, because I am flexible, but I will not tolerate being rewritten by him, and I will not allow my voice to be silenced.”

Boundaries. It’s not a bad look on her, not at all, and Andrea can see why Lena might gravitate to someone like Kara. There’s strength hidden behind those convictions and morals. Not the kind that breaks people like twigs, but the kind that’s a bastion of calm in a storm.

Andrea smiles. “And I never had any intention of silencing you, Kara. Glad we cleared that up.”

“Good.” Kara nods, turns on her heel, and strides out of her office.

No, it’s definitely not a bad look on her, but Andrea will have to keep an eye on Kara Danvers to make sure it doesn’t go to her head. The last thing she needs right now is attempted mutiny on her ship.

Her eyes land on the time, she suppresses a sigh, and her hand sneaks into the cookie box under her desk, coming away with another treat. The creamy, gently sweet taste of dulce de leche on her tongue, Andrea pulls up her emails and gets back to work.

By the time she’s on top of her work again (and not the other way around), and Jenny has sent her her schedule for tomorrow, it’s almost 10 pm, and she hurriedly gathers her things and puts on her coat. Texting Lena, she crosses the bullpen, nodding at Kara when their eyes meet.

Kara is still at her desk, fingers typing away on her keyboard, and Andrea adds ‘strong work ethic’ to the pro column in her head. Kara has had to leave work for a few hours this afternoon—some sort of emergency, some family matter—but she’s making up for lost time now, and Andrea is pleased her gut feeling about Kara has proved to be correct. Firecracker tendencies she can deal with, but she needs people who are dependable. People who show up and do the work.

In the back of her car, Andrea checks her phone again. Lena hasn’t answered her text, but it’s no matter. Lena gets lost in her work, her focus unbreakable when she’s solving a problem or fiddling with a puzzle. They both know this. They both know, and that’s why her driver isn’t taking her home but straight to Cordova Street.

She doesn’t worry. She trusts that Lena has had dinner and will remember to wrap up in time for Andrea to pick her up. It has been a couple weeks, and they have fallen into an easy routine. Lena thrives on routine, on accountability and kept promises.

Her face is a little fuller, her eyes are a little brighter; and, while Lena is always beautiful, Andrea loves to watch the light return to her features, loves the way she begins to take up space in her own body again, her curves filling out and resting comfortably in all the right places.

After weeks of focusing on the basics, Lena finally reclaims her own skin, takes responsibility for her body and its wants and needs— even when she’s signed it all over to Andrea for the time being. Hopefully, one day, she won’t even have to do that. Until then, Andrea will make damn sure Lena is taking care of herself like she should be.

“Good evening, Miss Rojas,” Lena’s PA greets her with a warm smile, and Andrea smiles right back. She likes the girl. Capable, diligent, and discrete. Also, anyone who can wrangle Lena Luthor on a daily basis and make it look like nothing, automatically has her approval.

“Good evening, Jessica,” Andrea says, stopping and handing her her coat. Even if Lena has wrapped up her work for the day, like Andrea has asked her to, it usually takes them some time to actually leave her office. Not that long, Andrea makes sure of it, but certainly too long to keep her coat on. “How are you today?”

“Very well, thank you,” Jessica says. “Miss Luthor should be ready for you; she told me to hold her calls about an hour ago and has ordered Chinese, and I’ve cleared her schedule for the rest of the evening. Also, she has a late start tomorrow. Conference call has been moved to Thursday.”

Andrea nods through the report, keeping her smile in place. She likes what she hears; she likes it a lot. “Thank you, Jessica.”

They nod at each other, acknowledging, for a second, what neither of them is saying out loud, then Andrea turns her attention to the heavy doors and walks over to pull them open.

Inside Lena’s office, the lights are dimmed, the brightest light coming from Lena’s computer rather than the overhead lights, which is why Andrea’s eyes need a moment to adjust. Even so, they still catch the sudden movement, coinciding with a startled intake of breath.

Hiding her smirk, Andrea closes the door, and tsks disapprovingly. She shakes her head. “Lena, Lena, Lena.”

She can’t see it from all the way across Lena’s dimly lit office, but Lena’s face is probably burning scarlet already. Just the way she likes it.

“D-Don’t be mad,” comes Lena’s small voice at once, high-pitched and trembling like a mortified schoolgirl, and Andrea wants to laugh, but doesn’t. She isn’t mad. On the contrary, part of her rejoices at this new development; welcomes catching Lena with her skirt bunched up and her hand down her panties with open arms, because it means Lena is getting where she needs to be. It means, Lena’s body is finally waking up, and, whenever it does, it is insatiable.

Feeding the animals, however, and doing so without permission and unsupervised, is against the rules. And Lena knows it. 

Drawing herself up to her full height, her eyes resting on Lena, Andrea crosses over to her desk. She leans on it, palms flat on the cool white surface, pinning Lena in place with a stern look. “You know this is against the rules, _reinita_ , now don’t you?”

“Yes, ma’am.” Lena’s eyes flicker to her screen, then to Andrea, then back to her screen again; and before Andrea can tell her not to, she’s tapped a few keys, clicked a few things, and the unmistakable jingle of the machine powering down fills the silence.

Sneaky little thing.

“Do I want to know what you’re trying to hide from me so badly, little girl?”

Lena shakes her head.

Andrea loves how she can almost taste the embarrassed heat in Lena’s cheeks—cheeks glowing a delicious candy apple red—and contemplates making her turn her computer back on and show her exactly what has gotten her so worked up that she just couldn’t keep her hands north of the border, but then decides against it.

“Hmm. Let me see that hand?”

Lena extends her left hand, and Andrea chuckles. “No, honey, the other one?”

Casting her eyes down, Lena hesitates. Her right hand is in her lap, clawing a fistful of her skirt, and Andrea watches as the long fingers twitch around expensive fabric.

“Today,” she prompts, and Lena swallows hard. She nibbles at her bottom lip, and Andrea snaps her fingers to get her to stop before she breaks the skin and tastes blood. When Lena lets go of her skirt and lifts her hand slowly, Andrea reaches for it and, wrapping her fingers around the wrist, yanks it closer to her face, nearly pulling Lena out of her chair.

She can smell Lena’s arousal. It stains her fingers like fingerprinting ink, sending a warm tingle through her body. She inhales deeply, then presses a kiss to those disobedient digits, relishing in the soft gasp her actions draw from Lena.

“You were going to make yourself come without my permission,” Andrea states. It isn’t a question. If she hadn’t gotten here when she had, Lena would have made quick work of forbidden territory and scratched that itch, all consequences be damned.

Her naughty girl can’t meet her eyes.

“I was just—” she stammers, but breaks off, because they both know Andrea is right.

“Yes, Lena, you were just having a good hard look at whatever that was—” Andrea nods at the computer screen, “—and your fingers somehow found their way into your underwear and landed directly on your clit.”

Lena’s mouth falls open, but no sound, no apology, drips from her quivering lips, and Andrea smirks. She puts her hands on her hips. “Well?”

Lena hates when she does this, when she makes her confess her sins and has her suggest appropriate means of penance in token of her penitence— which is exactly why she does it.

“I… I was going to,” Lena mumbles, then rushes the words out with her next exhale. “I was fingering myself under my desk, hoping to get myself off.”

Their eyes meet briefly, but Lena can’t handle the high-voltage attention for longer than a split second.

Andrea tsks again. “And what am I supposed to do with you now, hmm, little girl?”

She doesn’t expect a reply. Not in so many words anyway. She expects just what the troublemaker is giving her: hot shame written all across her face, chin tucked into her chest, hands folded demurely in her lap. She looks as if butter wouldn't melt in her mouth, but Andrea knows what that mouth is capable of.

She doesn’t waste any time proceeding. “ _Reinita_ ,” she says, her voice automatically dropping to _disciplinarian_ , deep and scolding, and, no doubt, winding Lena up even further. Uncomfortably so. Well, she can suffer a little. “You’ve touched what isn’t yours to play with. You have broken the rules. I guess you know what happens now.”

She watches Lena squirm in her seat; watches her chest heave; watches her lashes flutter as she blinks rapidly.

Lena knows. Lena knows the rules and the routine so well that her hands go to the desk and grip the edge as she gets to her feet. Her skirt slides down her legs as she stands, but she doesn’t reach back to stop it. She leans forward, bending at the waist. Her eyes glued to the desk, she steps out of the skirt and kicks it aside. 

“I’m sorry, ma’am.”

She waits, her pretty ass poised and her head bent, ready to suffer the repercussions of her actions.

“Oh, you will be,” Andrea concurs, stepping behind her and running the tip of her index finger over the suspiciously damp patch of fabric between Lena’s legs. She’s barely touching her at all, but the brief contact goes through Lena like a flipped switch, making her jerk forward. She whimpers, and Andrea feels the shiver that’s running down her spine as she places her other hand on Lena’s hip.

Grinning, she melts her body to Lena’s, lets her fingertips dance over Lena’s hip bone and the hollow just beneath it, then edges further until her fingers come to rest on the waistband of Lena’s panties. 

Lena squirms beneath her, and lets out a little sigh that almost has Andrea break character and laugh out loud. No one sighs quite as dramatically as Lena Luthor.

“You’re already a little sorry now, aren’t you, Lena?” She whispers the question, hot and heavy at Lena’s ear, and gets a very sorry little whine in response.

Well, she that will not hear must feel. Or not feel.

Without warning, Andrea steps back, drawing another whine from Lena. Lena cranes her neck to try and look back at her, and Andrea pinches the back of her thigh. Not too hard. Just hard enough.

Lena squeaks.

“Do not move. You hear me?”

“Yes, ma’am. Err, no, ma’am!” Lena sounds so enticingly breathless, already boneless and trembling with need. Her need is heavy in the air and ruining her underwear, and Andrea feels her own desire stepping out on the dancefloor to tango, a sensual rhythm pulsing low in her body.

Taking another step back to collect herself, she mentally flips through her options.

The leather belt that sits loosely on her own hips may be a little too much. Then again, this might only be the first time she has caught Lena red-handed, but, as much as it is a good sign, it is also a broken rule, and she can’t let it become a habit.

Belt, hairbrush from her purse, or hand? As Andrea looks down at her hands, trying to decide, her eyes come across a fourth option. One she likes even better than the others. Grinning, she picks up the ruler from Lena’s desk and slaps it against her palm.

Yes. Perfect.

“Color, Lena?” She asks calmly, waiting for the right answer before she draws back and brings the ruler down hard enough to leave an instant red streak across Lena’s skin— the parts that aren’t hidden by black panties anyway. 

“I certainly hope it was worth it, little girl.”

She doesn’t wait for Lena to respond before striking a second time, feeling the piece of wood tremble in her hand as it makes contact.

The skin on Lena’s ass skips pretty pink and goes straight to maroon, and her thighs clench. Andrea knows without looking that Lena is gritting her teeth, trying desperately to keep quiet, and squeezing her eyes shut.

“Now, tell me again, _reinita_ , why we don’t play with other people’s possessions.”

She isn’t being unreasonable. Unreasonable would be denying Lena orgasms altogether or turning her back on her when she reaches for her in the middle of the night. She does none of those things. Lena can come as many times as she wants— well, as many times as Andrea deems appropriate anyway— but she has to _ask_ first.

“Ask permission first,” Lena pants, the words coming out clipped.

“Very good,” Andrea praises, resting the ruler in her palm. “And did you?”

“No, ma’am,” Lena says, her voice a throaty whisper. “I’m sorry, ma’am.”

Andrea lets the ruler find its mark a third time, leaving another tiger stripe in its wake, and Lena takes it like a champ, throwing her head back but only letting out a stifled whimper and a soft moan.

Good girl.

While the walls aren’t paper thin, Lena’s office isn’t exactly soundproof either, and her PA is still out there, somewhere within earshot. Andrea almost trusts the girl enough to keep her mouth shut either way, and contemplates one more for the road for Lena, but she doesn’t much fancy handing out NDAs like hard candy or throwing hush money at people, if they take it too far in here tonight.

Letting out a breath, she tucks the ruler in her back pocket for safekeeping, leaving her hands free to caress and soothe. She runs them up Lena’s thighs, over her ass, and across the small of her back, before wrapping her arms around Lena’s middle and gently pulling her up off the desk and into her embrace.

“Something to think about,” she murmurs, feeling Lena’s back press harder against her boobs. Lena's ass is pulled flush against her abdomen and radiating enough heat for Andrea to sigh longingly into Lena’s neck. She nuzzles the sensitive skin at the nape of it, breathing Lena in and keeping her there, then brushes it with her lips, peppering it with gentle little kisses.

Lena giggles, and Andrea groans internally.

This had been supposed to be a punishment for Lena, but now they’re both ridiculously worked up, with nothing to be done about it and a much too-long ride home ahead of them.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> \--- Thoughts? 😋


	6. Marks

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is approx. 99,8% porn and 0,2% feels. Read responsibly.

The penthouse is wonderfully warm. The lights come on the moment they step inside and dim automatically before Andrea has shut the door behind them. They leave their coats and heels and bags. Andrea’s hand is holding hers, communicating in little squeezes and gentle tugs, but Lena can barely listen.

She is nothing but heartbeat. Loud and fast; a drum in her ears and fingertips, a deep bass—thump ta-thump thump, thump ta-thump thump—between her legs. She is a violin string pulled taut, an eardrum ready to burst.

She is so wet; it makes her face burn.

Andrea lets go of her hand, leaving her standing in the middle of the room, and steps back.

“Hmm,” she muses, studying her. Her gaze is intense. It makes heat erupt on Lena’s skin wherever it lands and stings where it lingers. “Clearly, that didn’t work. Now, did it?”

Andrea’s smirk is a lit match, her tingling laughter gasoline, and Lena goes up in flame.

“No, ma’am.” She looks down, waiting, trying her best to keep still and not rub her thighs together in search of relief. The rug, sage with specks of gold, is soft under her feet, and she curls her toes into it.

“Would you like my help?”

Lena tries to swallow her heart back down into her chest. She wants to answer, but her pride struggles. She is a Luthor. She doesn’t need help.

If she doesn’t ask for it, however; ask for it out loud, Andrea will never give her what she wants. If she doesn’t _ask_ , she won’t get what she so desperately _needs_.

Lena hates that too. Wanting is one thing, but _needing_? Needing Andrea like she needs oxygen? Just like air, Andrea has slipped back into her life and made herself essential. And Lena is terrified that, when she inevitably leaves again, she won’t remember how to breathe on her own. She will drown. She will suffocate.

“Yes, please.” It’s no more than a whisper. She has to force the words past grinding teeth, and pauses to unclench her jaw. “Please help me, ma’am.”

“Good girl.”

The two simple words are butterflies in Lena’s stomach. They fly up, light and frantic, and impossibly beautiful, setting her abuzz with a different kind of warmth.

Before Lena can do more than sigh, Andrea’s lips are on hers, soft like summer clouds. She tastes surprisingly sweet. Warm sugar and lipstick. Behind the sweetness, however, linger teeth, sharp and possessive, and Lena yields at once, melting into Andrea’s arms with a whimper.

She wants to deepen the kiss, but it’s Andrea who is in charge here and, apparently, she has other plans.

“ _Ahora_ , let’s see…” Andrea murmurs, trailing kisses down the side of her neck, unbuttoning her blouse. As her fingers move from button to button with precision and purpose, her mouth is hot on Lena’s skin; kissing and sucking, leaving little marks in her wake— one for each button she unfastens. She likes to do that. Likes to write her name all across Lena’s body in love bites and bruises.

Lena arches her neck to accommodate as best she can.

“Too many…” Slowly, Andrea works her way lower, her lips following her fingertips inch by inch. When her mouth moves back to her throat, Lena stops breathing, dizzy with the sensations flashing through her body, thrumming adrenaline and heat bringing her blood from a tolerable simmer to a desperate boil.

“I want you naked.” Andrea’s tongue runs up and down the pulse in her throat, her collarbone, down the soft slope of her shoulder and under the lacy hemline of her unbuttoned blouse. “Now.”

Andrea’s teeth sink into her shoulder, and Lena moans loudly, the last of her restraint and decorum leaving her body as teeth are replaced by tongue, by lips, tender licks and kisses soothing the sting.

“Uh… Uh-huh.” Her breath hitches, then leaves her in a whoosh. Her eyes flutter shut. She can’t keep track of Andrea’s hands anymore.

As Andrea’s mouth returns to hers— demanding and greedy, and cutting her oxygen right off— her hands are going everywhere, touching everywhere, slipping under clothes, unclasping, unzipping. They push and tug, slide and toss, and hold her steady, eagerly helping her out of her pencil skirt before slipping under her panties.

“Please, oh, please,” Lena whimpers as Andrea’s hand stills between her legs. She doesn’t care that she’s only half undressed; she doesn’t have the patience to wait like a good girl anymore.

She moves, feeling Andrea’s fingers slip and slide, her fingertips grazing just the right spot.

“Oh, no, no, no.”

A sharp pinch at her clit has her instinctively clench her thighs and butt muscles.

“I really need to train you better, hmm?” Andrea’s husky voice is right at her ear and making her tingle all over. Teeth tug on her earlobe. “Behave, little girl, or I will make you. Understood?”

Lena nods, swallowing thickly, but Andrea is looking for more. Before Lena can appease, give her what she wants, however, Andrea gives her nipples what her clit has gotten, and then some: a sharp pinch, a hard twist, and an almost painful tug.

Lena gasps, her hips thrusting forward involuntarily.

“Ow. Sorry, sorry!”

“I can still turn this into something else, _reinita_ ,” Andrea warns, and Lena scrambles about her brain, rounding up any and all remaining functioning brain cells. She doesn’t mind a punishment when it’s well-deserved, welcomes it even, sometimes, but if Andrea denies her now, flips this around on her, she is going to combust.

“Yes. I’m sorry, ma’am. Sorry! Uh. _Please_ , ma’am?”

“Hmm. Well...”

Andrea’s hands leave her body. She steps back, and Lena’s neck begins to prickle with a dreadful-but-not unpleasant anticipation that won’t let up again until she gets what she needs, whatever that might be. Clasping her hands in front of her body and glancing up at Andrea’s face, Lena isn’t quite sure about what that is anymore, even when the answer is literally leaking out of her and coating the inside of her thighs.

“So pretty. So needy.” Andrea smiles, as if presented with a feast in her honor, as she pushes open the undone blouse and finally does away with it when she has had her fill, leaving Lena in nothing but her panties. “And all mine.” She licks her lips and descends once more with a devilish grin, pulling Lena flush against her, her fingernails digging into the tender skin on Lena’s butt as she squeezes it. “Tell me,” she rasps into her neck. “Tell me exactly. What do you need?”

Lena feels herself flush, head to toe, at the husk of Andrea’s voice and what it is implying. Andrea _knows_ , knows all too well, what a filthy place her thoughts can be and how to trap her within them, making her twitch and writhe, until her lips part and all her dirty little secrets come falling out.

“I want… I need— _please_ , Andrea.” Lena can’t keep herself from trembling, her voice shaking with her. “Please.”

“Use your words, _princesa_.”

She manages to breathe a ‘yes, ma’am’ and, before she knows it, she is shoved against the back of the bedroom door, the cold doorknob pressing into her lower back. Her clit is throbbing in time with her heart, almost painfully, and her skin is on fire. Andrea’s leg pressed in between both of hers is both too much and not nearly enough, the rough fabric of her pants just causing enough friction— as Andrea presses up with her thigh— for Lena to lose her mind completely.

She whimpers. “Please… I need you to pin me down… hold my wrists. Twist my nipples and bite… bite until I scream—”

“Mmmm. What else?” Andrea’s voice is dripping with pleasure. She presses her lips to the sensitive spot right below her ear, her tongue darting out to taste her skin before she runs the tip over unfilled piercing holes, then sucks the lobe right into her mouth.

Lena isn’t sure she remembers how to speak, but she has to try anyway. “Touch… touch… fill me up,” she pleads, her head swimming from what Andrea’s tongue is doing.

Andrea releases her earlobe with a soft pop. “And?”

“Put your… your fingers in my mouth… and… and—” Lena falters, feeling as if she is falling and allowing her whole weight to rest on Andrea’s thigh, her body sagging against her.

“Make you lick yourself off them; lick them clean until your cheeks hurt?” Andrea supplies, her wicked grin riding every single syllable like the devil. “Call you a good little girl for the mess you’re going to make all over my Egyptian cotton?”

Lena wants to sob. “Please… _please_!” She wants to add more, make a good case for herself, but her head is empty and there are no more words. Just heat, and need, and her own desire rocking through her like a 7.0 earthquake.

Andrea laughs, kind of breathless, and Lena is completely lost in the onslaught of her wandering hands and mouth, barely noticing when the back of her legs connects with the bedframe and she falls backwards, trusting cool clouds of cotton to catch her like a sea of waiting hands.

Andrea is kneeling above her, hands pressed into the mattress on either side of Lena’s head and arms outstretched, smiling down at her in a way that leaves no doubt about anything.

She wants this, she needs this, and she’s completely at Andrea’s mercy. 

“So, if I remember correctly,” Andrea breathes, her chest heaving, silk blouse buttons threatening to burst from the strain. “This is what you asked for?”

Lena nods, a whimper rising in her throat. She wants to reach up and cup her breasts, undo buttons and open clasps until they spill into her palms, but she knows she’s not allowed, so her arms and hands stay on the bed.

Andrea’s lips are back on hers, her weight pressing her deeper into the duvet, and she leans up into the kiss, letting Andrea pull her close and take whatever she wants, do whatever she wants. She is wrapped in her sweet scent, in her warmth, enveloped in tender touches, and every movement of Andrea’s soft lips against her own sends little shocks of pleasure straight to her core.

“Such a good girl, asking for what you need,” Andrea praises, and as sure as night follows day, Lena feels it everywhere, melting, the softness and reverence disarming all her defenses and taking her heart prisoner even when she would have come willingly.

Andrea kisses an erratic pattern along Lena’s jaw and neck, making her way down to the hollow of her throat, where her tongue and teeth make a reappearance, laying out a fiery trail of breadcrumbs, of love bites and bite marks, down her sternum; a trail for Lena to follow with her fingers when she gets lost, alone in the dark.

It winds around her breasts, going back and forth between them, until it leads Andrea’s hungry mouth to a puckered nipple. She closes her lips around it, circles it with her tongue, and, latching on, begins to suck— and Lena is truly and completely gone.

She bites her lip, but can’t hold back the long whine or any of the gibberish that escapes her regardless; can’t stop her back from arching up to get closer to Andrea’s mouth. Even if she had, Andrea is operating a direct line to her clit, and she knows it.

“So soft, so beautiful,” she breathes the words into her skin, leaving kisses, praise, and a never-ending string of endearments to seep into it, all the way across her stomach and back up again. “ _Mi amor, cariño, cielo_ …”

As she kisses her face, her hand slips between Lena’s legs, her fingers cupping her gently while her thumb rubs her lightly, alternating between lazy circles and fast flicks, adding just a little bit more pressure each time.

“Please,” Lena croaks. “Please more.”

She wishes she wasn’t still wearing her panties, wishes Andrea would tear them right off the next second, and hurry up and have her way with her already. Which is probably precisely why she is taking her sweet time instead, watching Lena’s face with a tender smile on those plump, red lips, while she teases her within an inch of her sanity.

“You like that, I know. Shh.” Andrea breathes hotly against her cheek as she chuckles. A lone finger slides across it and down to her jaw before she traces its path with her tongue, and Lena is nothing but ragged breath and whimpered pleas.

Every touch, every rub, every kiss has her skin crackle with restless need, her inner muscles clenching desperately around nothing. “Please, ma’am. Please, I need… I need you. Touch me?”

Andrea laughs throatily, but obliges, her fingers slipping into the waistband of her panties and finally tugging them out of the way, and Lena lifts herself high and long enough so they can be gone for good, tossed somewhere into the vast Neverland beyond Andrea’s Alaskan king-size bed.

“Do you want me to fuck you, Lena?”

Lena opens her mouth to reply, but before the words have even finished forming, she is nodding frantically, almost ridiculously desperate for Andrea’s skilled fingers buried deep inside her; buried deep where throbbing, liquid pleasure is radiating in time with her pulse and dripping out for everyone— for Andrea— to see.

She needs— no, she _craves_ it.

“I want to hear your beautiful voice, little girl.” 

Andrea runs her hands down her sides, her short nails raking down over her ribs. Her tongue is now tracing around her belly button; she licks all the way to her hip bone, which she nips at, marking her path, and soothes with her lips.

The gentle sting sends shivers down her spine; wave after wave after wave rolling downward and pooling between her thighs.

Andrea just grins, her hands now sliding up Lena’s legs and pushing them further apart.

Lena can feel her breath, hot and heavy, against her hip bone and, when Andrea looks up, her grin has turned into a self-satisfied smirk. Her lips are puffy, her chin and cheeks rubbed pink, and her hair is already beginning to stick to the crook of her neck. Lena has never seen anything or anyone more beautiful.

She reaches for Andrea, who links their hands briefly, kisses her palms, and then moves further down, gentle yet firm fingers tracing her outer labia for a moment before she runs them through her folds, right through all the waiting wetness, up and down, up and down, tantalizingly slow, making Lena twitch and moan, her muscles tensing as her heels dig into the sheets. 

“That’s it,” Andrea coos. “Breathe, baby, breathe.”

Lena sucks in a greedy, shuddering breath. The air around them seems to have thinned to something less than air, and time has slowed— almost ceasing to exist entirely as sparkling blue meets emerald green, and holds.

And holds.

Pressure builds in Lena's belly with every stroke of Andrea's fingers, and when Andrea presses her thumb against Lena's pearl, it rips a sound right from her throat that Lena hasn’t even known her vocal chords and mouth could make.

Her heart races, her breath rattles, and she squeezes her eyes shut in exquisite agony as Andrea’s fingers continue their tortuous ministrations.

“Please-please-please-please.” Her pleas run together into one long, breathless whine, and Andrea kisses her cheek, dragging her lower lip over it, then nibbles at her pulse point. Moving back up, her tongue darts out to swipe at the corner of her mouth as she watches Lena writhe and suffer, before suddenly wrapping the fingers of her free hand around her jaw, fingernails digging in slightly.

“Please what?” Her breath is hot. And sweet. And intoxicating. “Look at me.”

“Fuck me. Please, fuck me,” Lena pants out, not even caring how pathetic she sounds. In all honesty, Andrea has barely touched her, but it doesn’t matter, because she is a needy, withering mess, and she will beg, beg on her knees, if she has to. Her Luthor pride be damned. Her mother would be horrified.

Their lips meet in a flurry of sloppy, passionate kisses.

“I thought you’d never ask.”

Andrea tilts her head as her lips press harder against Lena’s; her tongue darting out to slide along Lena’s slightly parted and waiting ones. There’s a stinging cut in her bottom lip, the skin broken where Lena has bitten down one time too many or too hard, and Andrea soothes it with her tongue, swallowing up Lena’s wanting whimper with the next kiss.

It is long; and unbearably tender.

Lena is so far gone, she barely registers Andrea’s fingers slipping inside; not at first, anyway, not until Andrea keeps adding digits and is picking up speed, pumping in and out rhythmically.

“You’re so wet,” she murmurs. “My beautiful naughty girl.”

Lena moans and whimpers and whines, allowing herself to make noise; to be all sensation and no thought. It feels strange, and shameful, and _wrong_ , but also wonderfully _liberating_ ; and the more she lets herself sink into her flesh and just _feels_ , and the more enthusiastic Andrea’s responses and ministrations grow, the more she can let go. She breathes and grunts and mewls. Her whimpers grow into whines, into moans, loud and throaty, and she hasn’t got a single care in the world— safe for what is happening between her legs. 

“So good, so _go-od_ ,” Lena whines, dragging out the vowel and arching her back. Her walls flutter and clench around Andrea’s fingers, and, barreling towards bliss and oblivion, she almost forgets. Almost.

“Ma’am? Please, uh—” Boneless, breathless, and sweaty, she can barely get the words out, but she _has_ to. “ _Please_ , may I—?”

She swallows, gasps for air. Her left hand claws into the sheets, fingernails scraping across the soft fabric, and the other is clinging to Andrea’s back under her blouse, like moss to an oak. She can feel her move; can feel her muscles arching and tensing, as she digs her nails into Andrea’s shoulder blade, leaving behind a few crescent marks of her own.

“Yes, baby, just like that,” Andrea says. “So good, so perfect. Come for me, _mi amor_.” 

Andrea’s voice is raw and raspy, thick with her own desire and arousal, and it’s the final straw that breaks Lena clear in two. She breaks with a scream, comes fast and hard; comes undone all over Andrea’s hand and her expensive sheets, with blinding pleasure rocking through her body until she sees stars.

Riding the high, she accidentally scrapes her fingernails down Andrea’s shoulder and arm a little too roughly, the shock of her mistake jerking her lungs and forcing her eyes open, but Andrea responds with a low growl that vibrates through her and goes straight to her clit, and another little cry escapes her throat. Her hips push down, bucking against Andrea’s hand, feeling the little tremors, the aftershocks, that have her shake, and tremble, and twitch, until she comes crashing down for good, collapsing back into the pillows.

She blinks up at Andrea dazedly; looks right into her beautiful eyes. They are darker than normal, her pupils overblown with lust.

“Hi,” she murmurs, wrapping her arms around Andrea’s neck and pulling her down on top of her for a kiss.

“Hi.”

Andrea breaks the kiss to press her forehead to Lena’s, breathing just as heavy as she is. She breaks the kiss, and she breaks character, something flickering in her eyes when she asks, “Are you okay?”

“Yeah.”

“Do you want me to hold you, _corazón_?”

Lena nods. “Please, I need you.”

They both laugh when Andrea noisily rolls off her, reversing their positions and pulling Lena into her arms.

“ _Besarte es como ver las estrellas_ ,” Andrea murmurs into her shoulder, pressing a kiss to her skin. “But you are a piece of work, honey.”

Even heated up and sweaty like she is, Lena feels herself blush something fierce. Well, if she doesn’t know it. “Thank you for putting up with me anyway,” she says, curling up on instinct and resting against Andrea’s chest, listening to her heart do its thing.

“Always.” Andrea takes her fingers gently in hers and closes her own around them.

They are warm. The fingers of someone very much living, very much alive and in love with life, and Lena is so oddly reassured by that; reassured by how her fingers feel in Andrea’s, that she laces them together and brings them to her chest, gazing down at the long fingers and pink seashell nails that are always perfectly trimmed. She brushes her lips to her knuckles, kissing one after the other.

They are good hands, Andrea’s hands. Slender and even. Feminine. They hold strength, and so much love— and now, they’re also holding Lena’s battered and bruised heart. Lena wonders if Andrea has had it this whole time, or only since the scent of vanilla and berries has become one of comfort again.

“Can I take this off?” Her free hand worries at Andrea’s blouse, tugging it from her pants. She is butt-naked and Andrea is in her work clothes, and it really isn’t fair. Lena pouts.

Andrea chuckles. “No, but I will.”

She untangles herself and rises to quickly strip down to her lace panties (which are so sheer and so see-through, they might as well not be there). Even in the dimly-lit bedroom, she is absolutely breathtaking, her skin golden caramel, her gorgeous curves full and in all the right places. With the soft moonlight filtering through the blinds behind her, she looks like something unreal, something from a dream.

Before she can sink back onto the bed next to her, Lena scrambles to her hands and knees, crawling over to the edge, over to Andrea. Under Andrea’s observant gaze, she tugs her legs in under her body and sits back on her heels, her hands finding Andrea’s thighs like magnets, her fingers splaying out over heated skin.

Andrea rakes her hand through Lena’s hair, fists a handful and gives it a rough tug that has Lena’s scalp tingle happily, then she tucks one strand carefully behind her ear, her fingers dancing over sensitive skin and making Lena squirm.

Andrea doesn’t speak. She doesn’t remove her hands or comment on the way Lena’s mouth is level with her _concha_ , her pretty little shell that isn’t a shell— not to Andrea, even though Lena is so close, she can smell her, smell everything.

Sucking her bottom lip into her mouth, Lena reaches for expensive lace, running a fingertip over the pattern appreciatively and casting her eyes up to meet Andrea’s, silently asking permission. When she finds it written all across her features, she slowly tugs the delicate piece of lingerie down over Andrea’s butt, pausing briefly when Andrea puts her hands on her shoulders. Andrea lets her slide it lower, down her thighs and past her knees, then steps out of it and kicks it aside.

Andrea doesn’t shave, she trims— occasionally. Lena softly kisses her stomach right below her belly button, running her fingertips over the coarse little curls and smiling into the kiss when she feels Andrea’s muscles twitch under her lips.

She caresses and kisses, trailing affection from Andrea’s belly to the hollow of her hip. Faint stretch marks on her hips— from the turbulent teenage years when her weight had fluctuated radically— bracket her lower abdomen, and Lena runs her fingers over the pale lines gently before tracing them with her lips.

As her mouth is busy playing the maze game on Andrea’s hip, the fingers on her left hand are running through Andrea’s little curls again, stroking, dancing, circling, creeping lower and lower until Lena dips her index finger into soft, liquid heat. Pressing deep, she relishes the feeling of warm velvet pulsing around her; moaning softly when Andrea’s walls close around her and suck her in greedily.

Lena would happily give as she has received, but, before she can, Andrea grabs her wrist. With a low growl, her fingers close around it, causing Lena to whimper as her hand is yanked away. Andrea’s grip is hard, right on the verge of painful; the feeling going through Lena like a whip taken to her skin, crackling electricity spiking through her with every beat of her racing heart as she waits with bated breath.

“No.” Andrea shakes her head, lets go, pushes her over onto her back with both hands and clambers on top of her, crawling until she is straddling her, her knees on either side of Lena’s head as she looks down her body with a wicked grin playing at her lips. She hasn’t lowered herself down yet, but her meaning is crystal clear, and Lena wets her lips in anticipation.

Leaning up, her hands grab Andrea’s pert ass, slide down and around to her thighs, her nails digging into the soft flesh as she pulls herself up, closer to where her mouth should be.

Andrea inhales sharply, then blows out a shuddering breath, the ripples moving down her body and making her skin pebble, and Lena smirks, letting her tongue dart out and lap at thin air to work Andrea up further.

If she wanted to, she could work her up maddeningly slow, but dallying would get her in trouble, so she doesn’t dare.

Even so, Lena doesn’t go for gold at once. Instead her mouth latches onto the inside of Andrea’s thigh. She kisses and sucks her way up and down, tasting sweat and something spicy, her tongue stumbling over the raised lumps of Andrea’s scars, over the thickest ones— two desperately bold lines, three.

There are more scars here, Lena knows, like age rings on a tree, but her tongue can barely feel most of them. They have faded with time, hardly noticeable anymore. Only the three thick ones remain; are still livid on the soft, defenseless skin.

Peppering little kisses along them, Lena wonders briefly if they will ever fade, or if Andrea will be permanently reminded of what she had done, drunk on whiskey and pain, at sixteen.

Lena works her way up. When she gets to where she wants to be, she nuzzles Andrea, parts her folds with her tongue, and presses a kiss to her clit, latching on, her chest inflating with pride at the soft little sound her actions draw from Andrea’s lips.

Her focus now singular, honed in on Andrea’s pleasure, she reaches around for her butt again, squeezing and kneading, and tugs Andrea forward, pulls her down with her, briefly breaking her mouth’s seal around her clit.

Chasing satisfaction, Andrea follows her mouth. Her hands link with Lena’s, bringing Lena’s arms around as she lowers herself carefully, aligning herself with Lena’s mouth.

Before she has fully settled, perching like a queen on her throne, Lena licks a broad stripe from her entrance up to her clit, flicking at it playfully before latching back on.

She sucks, and Andrea hisses, pinning her wrists savagely over her head.

“Behave.”

Lena moans against the sensitive parts at her mercy, the sound rumbling low in her chest, and Andrea answers in kind. She tastes like copper and milk, her juices pooling in Lena’s mouth before she swallows. Breathing through her nose, she eagerly laps up more, laps greedily, her cheeks burning with gratification.

Her tongue laps, and licks, and flicks; then plunges in, pumping into Andrea before returning to her clit. Lena drinks in her desire, her face covered in Andrea’s delicious wetness, and as she feels Andrea tense, her thighs beginning to tremble with pure pleasure, she nips at her clit with her teeth. Again. And again.

Andrea inhales sharply and tips her head back, letting go of Lena’s wrists. “F-Fuck.”

Putting her newfound freedom to good use, Lena presses inside her with her finger. She goes slow, but deep, grazing Andrea’s most favorite spot, soft and spongy, over and over again; pulsing her tongue in time with her finger. Andrea is close, she knows it, her heart humming in her chest as she feels Andrea melt on top of her, feels her flutter and tremble and clench.

“ _Ah_ —! Lena!”

Her breath hitches. She is so beautiful. She is a piece of artistry.

“¡ _Ave María… Purísima_!”

Andrea shatters.

Arching her back, a silent scream dies on her quivering lips, and Lena brings a hand to her waist and grips her firmly, helping her keep upright as she bucks; as she allows Lena to coax her gently through her climax. She wails; she seizes and shudders.

Her release tastes like the ocean in winter, rough and salty, and Lena drinks every last drop, a rolling set of memories washing over her and making her eyes sting.

With Andrea’s taste on her tongue and love in her heart, she blinks up at Andrea, who slumps forward— panting, but supporting her own weight with trembling arms— then scoots lower, fusing their bodies together. They fit like puzzle pieces.

“G—Good girl, my good girl.” Andrea is kissing her face, cooing at her softly, and Lena’s chest swells. She knows she needs to figure out a way to be with her forever. She also knows there is no such thing as forever. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ... so? 😏 How are we all doing? Thoughts? 😋
> 
> * * *
> 
> There isn’t a lot of code-switching happening here, really. It’s mostly pet names and soft-soap, an interjection or two, and a pinch of dirty vocab. Anyway, have a list, just in case.
> 
>  **Andrea/(Lena) <> English** in this chapter:
> 
>   * Reinita — Little queen
>   * Princesa — Princess
>   * Mi amor — My love
>   * Cariño — Honey
>   * Cielo — Hun (sky, heaven) 
>   * Corazón — Sweetheart (heart) 
>   * “Besarte es como ver las estrellas.” — “To kiss you is like seeing stars.” 
>   * (La) Concha — innocent word for “the shell” in Peninsular Spanish. But in Argentina/Latin America ‘concha’ (also) translates as ‘vagina’ or, to put it crudely, ‘c*nt’. Neat, innit? 😏🐚🍑
>   * “¡Ave María Purísima!” — interjection. Actually, a prayer or plea to Mary (‘Ave María Purísima, sin pecado (original) concebida’ = ‘Oh/Hail, Mary, most pure, conceived without (original) sin’). Outside of this very… Catholic sense, ‘¡Ave María Purísima!’ is usually said when one is excited/very happy, stressed or surprised, exasperated or expressing displeasure. It’s sort of like saying ‘Oh My God!’ in English (but invoking the Virgin Mary’s name instead of Jesús’ 😉). 
> 



	7. Monsters

They have brought her a car. They have brought her a car, a dead, massive SUV, and strung it up to the ceiling like a metal-made carcass. It probably was Alex’s idea, and Kara hates her a little for it. She hates that Alex can tell. She hates that she is right.

No.

No, she is fine.

Fists pummel the hood, and feet kick in the roof, and Kara welcomes the ache in her muscles, the feeling of her fists going through pliable, black metal like tearing wet cardboard. The metal cracks, and breaks, and splinters— and Kara lets out a satisfied grunt.

She keeps her mind blissfully blank as she lets go; allows herself to reduce the decommissioned DEO vehicle to a scrapheap in the middle of the training room.

She can never do this during normal training, even with the air laced with varying levels of Kryptonite. Part of her is always holding back, overly conscious of the fragility of human bodies. She is careful— even with the most highly trained of agents. She couldn’t live with herself if she hurt someone. Yet, after— accidentally!— giving her sister a black eye the other day, no one wants to spar with her anymore. Or, perhaps, Alex has told them not to.

Alex's concerned face swims before her eyes, and Kara pauses for the time it takes to take a deep breath and wipe beads of sweat off her forehead.

The knot in her stomach tightens. She wishes there was another car.

Exhaling through her nose, she unclenches her fists, drops her arms to her sides. And, before she has even hit the shower, her anger evaporates like a puddle, leaving behind a vacuum, a dangerous nothingness, to be filled up with something quiet and heavy. It sits on her shoulders and on her chest, and makes it impossible to look herself in the eye when she enters the locker room and walks right past the row of mirrors on the wall.

Kara barely feels the water on her skin. She doesn’t smell the scent of her favorite body wash as she goes through the motions of washing the day’s events off her body. There’s the car, Alex’s wordless concern, the dinosaur at the exhibit, and the almost-pileup on the freeway, because of the sudden snowfall. And before all that, there is work. There is William Day. There is Miss Rojas. And there is Lena. There always is Lena.

Kara presses her palms hard against the tiles, lets the water hit her neck. She watches the lather and dirt go down the drain.

She is happy for Lena. Or at least that’s what she tells herself lying awake at night. She is so happy for Lena, it makes her heart want to burst out of her chest.

She’s happy that Lena is happy. She is happy to see her smile again. She is happy that someone is _making_ her smile— even if it isn’t her. Seeing Lena with Miss Rojas at the office almost every day now, Kara tells herself that too. Over and over again. And, mostly, it works.

In the moments it doesn’t, she wonders why it hurts so bad. Why it hurts so bad to see her friend laughing with someone else, hugging someone else, smiling at someone that part of Kara has begun to hate a little, teeny-tiny bit. But that has nothing to do with Lena. That is all about CatCo. She tells herself that too. Because it is true.

Andrea Rojas might be who Lena wants, but she is definitely not what CatCo deserves. She is a nightmare in red lipstick and heels, who loves her stupid buzz-words almost as much as she loves tearing Kara’s articles to metaphorical shreds right in front of her.

Kara just can’t win with Miss Rojas. She can work her butt off, try and do everything right— even when it makes her teeth ache to write the way Miss Rojas wants her to— and still find herself being reprimanded or rewritten. She doesn’t mind that her boss is hard on her— Cat and Snapper were too, after all— but, the having-her-words-clipped-and-edited part? Yeah, that one stings more than she likes to admit.

She hates herself a little for that too. For the way she lets it get to her, lets it affect her and her work. She has worked hard these past weeks— both as Supergirl and as Kara Danvers— because she can’t stand it. The way Miss Rojas’ lip curls over her teeth, the tiny shake of her head, the disappointment in her eyes.

She wants to do a good job. She wants her efforts reflected in her work.

She wants to do good. She wants to do better.

If she’s honest with herself, it’s what gets her out of bed in the mornings. Stubborn pride. Determination. She might not be able to fix things with Lena, but she sure as heck can try and fix this. And maybe then, then she’ll feel better about herself.

Shutting the water off abruptly, Kara dries herself off and puts on underwear, ignoring the way her skin feels hotter than it should or how her vision blurs a little. Pulling on socks and a clean T-Shirt down over her head, she doesn’t care that her ears are blocked or that she can hear nothing but her own heartbeat, dull and erratic.

A cool shiver runs down her spine and she finally sits down on a bench before her legs can give out from under her. Tasting her own heartbeat as she swallows hard, she curls into a ball, chin tucked against her chest and legs pulled up, and puts her hands over her head, listening to the thud-thud-thud as her heart races off into the night without her.

“Kara?”

Kara blinks furiously to clear her vision and sees her sister coming towards her, her hands slightly raised and her brows furrowed. “Hey. Are you okay? Kara?”

Before she knows it, a sob has broken free from her chest, and she doesn’t understand why or where it came from.

Alex sits down next to her and just pulls her into a hug.

She doesn’t understand why she is crying, but the hug still feels nice, Alex’s strong arms and steady heart grounding her, tethering her to her body and the moment, and helping her to hold it together even as she’s falling apart within the embrace.

“Oh, Kara,” Alex’s voice says, her fingers raking through her damp hair and trailing down her back. She feels her sister sigh. “Do you want to talk about it? What can I do?”

Wiping her cheeks, Kara looks up at her, looks into Alex’s kind brown eyes.

“I’m fine. I’m fine. I just…”

Alex gives her that look. That look that says ‘bullshit’ in big, bold lettering. She sighs again, tilts her head, and when Kara looks at her face this time, her eyes are soft and warm, like melting chocolate poured over a stack of freshly-baked pancakes.

Alex licks her lips. “I— I could try and talk to her for you? Lena? I could—”

Kara freezes, shakes her head quickly. “No! I mean no, Alex.” She sniffles. “It’s… it’s not about… um, it’s got nothing to do with—” she forces herself to say the name. It tastes bitter on her tongue. “Lena.”

“Right.” Alex doesn’t believe her. Of course not. Part of her doesn’t believe herself either. “It’s just, Kara—”

Kara shakes her head again, jumps to her feet. She hears herself babbling something about the snow, and the dino, and William Day, and that article on the stupid Obsidian launch party and what people were wearing— like anyone _cares_ ; anything to fill her head with noise as she puts on her pants and pulls up the zipper.

Alex doesn’t interrupt, just lets her talk and wordlessly hands her her hoodie, but Kara knows she’s not fooling her big sister one bit. She is glass, and Alex can see right through her. She is made of glass, and there are cracks all over her.

“Come on then,” Alex says, leaning in to fix her hood. She pulls on the strings. “Pizza and potstickers. On me.”

“I—” Kara doesn’t remember what she’s had for lunch, and she must be hungry for sure, but she doesn’t feel it. She isn’t sure she even _wants_ pizza and potstickers.

She watches Alex pick up her muddy super-boots and throw them into her locker. Alex gathers her crumpled suit, and cape, and towel and stuffs them into her sports bag, before zipping it closed and hefting it on her shoulder. Catching Kara’s gaze, she smiles and holds out one arm in invitation, and Kara ducks her head, accepting gratefully. Maybe some dinner wouldn’t be so bad?

“And a chocolate milkshake?” she asks.

“And a chocolate milkshake,” Alex confirms, her arm wrapped around Kara’s shoulders as they leave the locker room.

They don’t talk about it. Alex doesn’t mention Lena’s name again. They just eat.

Alex tells her about the progress Kelly has made with two of her severely traumatized patients, and Kara— grudgingly— hates her new boss and her stupid tech company a little bit less.

“Okay.” Leaning back in her seat, Alex blows out a breath. She searches Kara’s face, and Kara feels something electric go through her, straightening her spine and lifting her head. “This might be really bad timing.” Alex pauses. “It _is_ really bad timing. But, Kara—?”

Kara braces herself. Her eyes are sharp, her muscles ready.

“The… agency called?”

It takes her a moment to hear her sister, truly hear the words, but when she does, she feels her mouth fall open.

“Yeah. Uh, so…” The small, tentative smile that is blooming on Alex’s face is beautiful, and it tells her everything she needs to know. “There’s a… they think they’ve found a match this time.”

“Wow,” Kara breathes, feeling her heart flutter at the unexpected news.

“Yeah.” Alex runs a hand through her hair. Her cheeks are pink. “The… the mom’s really young. It… would be a closed adoption.” She pauses for a deep breath. “If it goes through this time, that is. And, uh... the kid?” She swallows. “The kid… is half-alien. But they couldn’t tell me what… you know, what _kind_. The mom won’t say. Or… she doesn’t know.”

Kara blinks. “What?”

“I… I still want to do it,” Alex says, lowering her voice. “Even if I don’t know. Is that crazy?”

Kara smiles. “No. It’s… you.”

They look at each other for a long moment.

“I’m most definitely crazy,” Alex says, half-talking to herself. “I just… I can’t stop thinking about it, you know?”

Kara nods.

“They… The agency says most people wouldn’t even _consider_ taking in a half-alien kid. Even if they have all the details. It’s like… this little one doesn’t even stand a chance, Kara. He’ll grow up in the system.”

“He’ll… have a chance with you,” Kara says, tentatively. “More than a chance.”

A young girl and an unidentified alien? Kara doesn’t like the sound of that. She knows that not all aliens who come to Earth have good intentions or live peacefully amongst the humans. Perhaps, she is wrong about this. Hopefully, she is wrong. She isn’t wrong about this baby and her sister, though. Alex would be an amazing mom to this child. If anyone could do it, it would be Alex.

“So you think I should do it?” Alex’s face rests on her chin, her expression half hidden behind her hand. Kara can read it anyway— just from looking at her eyes and the lines around them. 

“I think you want to.”

Alex has already made up her mind, Kara can tell. She doesn’t need her opinion, let alone her permission, but she has her support— if she wants it. Always. “What does Kelly think about it?”

Alex grimaces. “She’s… on the fence.” Seeing Kara’s expression, Alex hastily goes on, saying, “Not about the baby. She doesn’t… it’s the timing, she says. You know, with me making director and her just starting at her new job? She’s worried we won’t have enough… that there won’t be enough time for—”

Kara points at her chest. “World-class babysitter. Comes with the ability to heat up bottles, cool down boo-boos, and doesn’t even need a baby monitor to, well, _monitor_.”

Alex laughs. “Yeah… about that, um.”

“Hey!” Kara feels herself inflate with mock-indignation, and points her chop-sticks at Alex. “I’m good with kids! Kids love me!”

“Kids love Supergirl. _You_ lost Cat Grant’s son on a high-speed train that had a bomber on it.”

“Oh, har-har. Carter is fine.” Kara rolls her eyes. “Hey. Um. What did Eliza say about this?”

Alex almost chokes on her soda. “Don’t you dare tell Mom anything!” She warns. “Not until… it’s official. I don’t… need that kind of pressure. She… whoa. No, Kara.” Alex touches her forehead. “Promise me you won’t say anything.”

Kara mimes zipping her mouth shut, and turns an imaginary key in the lock before throwing it over her shoulder. For good measure.

Alex laughs again. “Okay.”

They sit, and eat, and talk for a little while longer, and for those wonderful moments, those stolen minutes, Kara forgets all about CatCo and her job, Miss Rojas and Lena. She feels light and happy, giddy with excitement for her sister and her soon-to-be little family.

It isn’t until she gets home, returns to her dark and empty apartment, and lets herself fall onto her bed, face-first and fully clothed, that her restless thoughts find her again.

She starts off by thinking about Eliza, about how thrilled her adoptive mom will be to become a grandmother. She pictures her face— those caring eyes that see everything, and that safe smile— and then thinks about all the different colors of yarn that Eliza will go and buy, about all the little shoes and blankets she will knit.

She thinks about the baby next. About that little boy, only half in this world, and already alone with no one who wants him. Well, no one but her sister and Kelly. With Alex in his life, that little boy will be so loved. The thought alone makes Kara’s throat constrict with emotion.

She is happy for Alex. She is happy for the little boy. And she’s happy for Lena.

She is so happy, it makes her cry into her pillow.

She cries until she falls asleep.

When she wakes up again, only a meager three hours of blissful unconsciousness have passed, but she drags herself up out of bed anyway, and shuffles into the bathroom to brush her teeth and comb her hair. She doesn’t have the energy to shower, makes do with a wet washcloth and deodorant, but at least puts on a clean bra and shirt, and checks her pants for stains before putting them on.

She fills her travel mug with coffee, but doesn’t have breakfast. Her stomach is already in knots again. And her mind is buzzing and stinging, urging her to hurry up and get going. Perhaps, if she makes it into the office before everyone else, she can watch the sunrise, watch as the light slowly floods the bullpen, and everything will be quiet and calm enough for her to finish the article that is due today. Perhaps she will finish it before Andrea Rojas even sets foot in the building.

CatCo is indeed quiet, almost eerily so, but not for long. After the sun has come up, people start arriving, their footfalls like soft rain falling on Kara’s brain. Slow at first, gentle. Pitter-patter. Then they’re drumming on her thoughts like a shower of stones.

They break her concentration, and Kara sighs, pushing back from her desk. She takes a sip of her coffee, looks around, then opens her snack drawer— only to find it completely empty. Right. She meant to do something about that. Well, she’s _this_ close to finishing her assignment. Food can wait. She will ride down and get herself a treat from Noonan’s when she is done.

Perhaps it is that decision— and her empty stomach and low blood sugar— which is responsible for her mood taking a hit about twenty minutes later. Perhaps, it is the two people who have just entered the building at ground-level.

Kara hears them before she can see them. Their heels, their heartbeats, their laughter.

She takes a slow breath and her hands still on her keyboard, so she can stop herself from breaking the keys, and finish this workday without a hitch. She doesn’t much like having to explain more broken equipment or office supplies to Miss Rojas. It’s awkward, and humiliating, and she doesn’t need that today.

Kara breathes and shakes out her hands, tries to close herself up inside her work and shut out all else as the elevator dings, but it’s useless.

As soon as the second elevator opens— no one but Andrea Rojas uses it anymore, not since Lena has left CatCo— and Miss Rojas and Lena step out, crossing the bullpen in a cloud of subtle laughter and perfume, Lena hanging on Miss Rojas’ arm like something that belongs in an art gallery, all pretty lips and pretty eyes and pretty everything, Kara’s hands become stupid, weary, and clumsy.

Things slip away from them, stretch out of shape, shatter. It’s how she finds out her travel mug isn’t as sturdy as she had hoped. And also how absorbent the carpet is.

Kara crouches down, picks up the pieces and dumps them into the trash; then goes into the bathroom to fetch enough paper towels to take care of the mess that the coffee-flood of biblical proportions has left under her desk.

She catches her own reflection— pale and tight-lipped— in the mirror and pulls a face at herself. She splashes her face with cold water and runs her wrists under the tap, waiting for her blood to cool down and her pulse to slow. The water feels nice on her wrists. She stays there, watching it wash around her skin until she can pretend she actually feels the cold.

When she has returned to her desk and cleaned up as best she can, she sits back down and stares at her screen. She blinks in time with the cursor, then looks down at her waiting hands on the keyboard. She takes another huge breath and starts to type. As she does, the shakiness is slipping away, finally.

That is, until she hears the music-box sound of Lena’s giggles.

“Andrea!” Lena’s voice stands out from the noisy bubble around her, an airy sigh floating behind the name that has Kara’s insides grow hard and prickly. And she can’t not listen, can’t stop herself from whipping around in her seat to find the source of the sound, or from making a strained animal noise when she finally does see them.

They aren't in Miss Rojas’ office, not yet, but tucked away in a corner, half hidden behind an empty desk and a column that breaks Kara’s line of vision.

Lena is leaning against the desk, and Miss Rojas is holding her face like it is something that could break; something that is fragile; something that could give way to pressure and pain and tears at any given minute. One hand cups that pale, ready-to-break, porcelain cheek, and the other is on Lena’s thigh, pushing gently, pushing so that Lena’s whole body molds itself to hers as she steps in between her legs.

Miss Rojas’ body comes in close to Lena’s— much, much too close. She’s got that winning smile on her face, doesn’t break eye-contact, even as Lena’s eyes dart all over; even as her giggles come out in eager little bursts that she tries to stifle, but can’t.

Miss Rojas holds her, steady and strong, and Lena seems to melt under her touch, her pulse frantic but subdued like a tiny mouse in a bird’s claw.

Only Lena isn’t scared. She _likes_ this.

Kara doesn’t know this side of her well, has only met it for the first time a couple weeks ago, and her anxiety deepens, before she watches Miss Rojas go in for a kiss. It is deep, much too passionate for the public space they’re in. Unprofessional. Thinking the word in connection with her boss gives Kara a moment of gleeful satisfaction, even as she feels little knots tangle in her stomach.

The kiss ends, Lena blushes, and Kara still can’t tear her gaze away. Unexpected anger stirs itself into her anxiety— like the milk she stirs into her coffee— and her whole body is buzzing with way too many feelings. Feelings she doesn’t understand.

Miss Rojas’ hands and lips wander, and Kara’s heart is a broken drum.

Andrea Rojas is in the office that should have been Lena’s. Or Cat’s. The woman that should be laughing with Kara is breathing on her neck and giggling into her skin. The moments that should have been theirs, stolen, and on display in front of her; in front of everyone.

Not that anyone else seems to notice. Or care.

And it is not as if _she_ wants to kiss Lena. She really doesn’t. But watching Miss Rojas do it?— It’s almost too much again. Kara digs her fingernails into her palms, curls her hands into fists so they can’t break anything.

Miss Rojas’ coat is open over her low-cut shirt, and Kara sees too much of her bare skin, golden and flushed with warmth, as her chest heaves with her breathing. It makes the little pendant dangling from her neck dance and quiver, and Lena touches it playfully, like she has done it a thousand times before. And maybe she has.

Kara’s muscles feel cold. Her feet feel like they are falling asleep. And she can feel the extra heat of her emotions burning away behind her eyes, as surely as she could feel the heat of a blazing fire. It can’t touch her, but it might scorch everything else, if she isn’t careful. She will not be able to work, to pretend everything is fine, if she can’t get herself back under control. Supergirl would never have trembling legs or boiling blood. Supergirl would never hurt people intentionally.

The only cure, the only thing she can think of to help her calm down and get back into her body enough to do her job and fix everything, is to have Miss Rojas trade places with her. If only for a few moments. Just long enough to hold Lena and whisper her apologies to her until she treats her like she used to. And it will happen. As far as Kara is concerned, they are going to be friends again.

There’s just one problem. A problem that won’t keep her hands or eyes off Lena.

Kara watches them kiss again. This time it’s Lena who kisses Miss Rojas. It’s sweet and slow, and lasts for an eternity— until they finally come apart for good. And when Lena slips away, slips out of Catco without so much as a glance to spare in her direction, Kara feels like she might cry. Break out in deep, ugly sobs, and collapse onto her desk. The urge to cry moves from her ribcage to her throat and into her sinuses. Like a different species. Attacking her from within. A monster with sharp claws and too many heads.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know, i know. A whole lot of words just to say 'Kara is sad'. It had to be said, though. Thoughts? 😊


	8. Tremors

It had been a good morning. They had woken up before their alarms and enjoyed the early morning hours— soft light, birdsong, warm sheets and sweet kisses. Lena had made coffee, while she had cut fruit and whisked eggs. Showering had almost derailed her schedule— well, that and Lena’s wandering hands— but they had somehow made it into the car and to CatCo on time regardless. There was no point to Lena coming along— other than Lena refusing to leave her side, of course. It was cute how she denied it, how she came up with her clever little excuses, but Andrea knew better. This was Lena— a little high on human touch and praise— clinging to her like a starfish and refusing to let go. It was cute and a little sad, and Andrea was much too soft to deny her sweet _estrella de mar_ when she looked up at her out of those big green eyes.

She had lavished all her attention on Lena for as long as she possibly could, even giving her a little thrill as a proper send-off, but they both have jobs to do, and Andrea isn’t pleased to find she is left a little too distracted to do hers— the way she wants to, the way she expects herself to do it— even long after Lena has left the bullpen.

Realizing she hasn’t taken in a single word, Andrea looks up from the article she is supposed to be reading and lets her eyes sweep the busy world outside her office. Like a colony of ants, CatCo is buzzing with orderly activity. The sound of fingers typing and phones ringing faster than they can be answered is music to her ears. Watching her people work on the other side of the glass is almost like watching a well-done science project, and Andrea is pretty sure that, if there were a fair, she would win.

She is well aware that at least half her staff doesn’t like her. The takeover, while anything but hostile, was sudden and unexpected for most of them, and some people adapt to change faster than others. She doesn’t hold it against them. As long as they do their work.

However, there are a few lost sheep amongst her flock. Those struggling with the transition the hardest, losing their footing with her shifting gears. And Andrea’s gaze softens when her eyes land on one, crumpled into a heap in her chair and sitting slightly hunched over her keyboard, her face in her hands. For someone who clearly works out, Kara Danvers’ posture is terrible.

Kara’s broad shoulders are shaking. She’s sitting too far away to make out much, but that much she can see, and Andrea would be lying to herself if she pretended otherwise. The helpless, desperate gesture goes through her like a jolt of electricity, and before she knows what she’s doing, she finds herself standing and walking, leaving her desk and her office to intervene and fix the problem— if she can.

Contrary to the rumor mill or office grapevine, she isn’t a heartless bitch. She wants CatCo to thrive, and it can only do that if everyone is bringing their best self to work. And sobbing into your keyboard in the middle of the workday hardly counts towards that. 

Feeling something twist in her stomach, Andrea briefly wonders if she’s pushed Kara too far. She knows she does that sometimes. She is pushy. She is demanding. She expects a lot. But she also doesn’t waste her time on people who don’t show great potential. She wouldn’t have pushed so hard if she didn’t think Kara’s work would benefit from it. She wouldn’t have been so hard on her if she wasn’t convinced it would help Kara hone her craft. All she wanted was for Kara to stretch that muscle, but, perhaps, now it is torn instead— and _if_ it is, it’s entirely her fault.

“Kara?” Feeling her heart doing basic samba steps in her chest, Andrea only just refrains from biting her bottom lip. She doesn’t do the lip biting. That’s Lena’s thing.

Watery, red-rimmed blue looks up at her, shaky hands brush at pink cheeks, and Andrea’s conscience slams on the brakes, giving her whiplash and making her pause for a steadying breath before she continues.

“Would you— Come step into my office for a minute?”

It’s still a request, because she’s still the boss, but her voice is as soft as she can make it— which is why the sudden heat in Kara’s gaze takes her by surprise. It only lasts a few seconds, but it’s so intense she actually feels herself rock back on her heels.

“Okay,” Kara says, her voice almost toneless as she gets to her feet, her back straight and head held high.

She doesn’t apologize or offer an explanation, and Andrea finds her respect for the other woman is growing— despite the most unfortunate situation they are both forced to deal with at present. There’s no shame in tears and Kara doesn’t owe anyone an explanation. As she waits for Kara to move, to round her desk and follow her, Andrea decides she won’t push for one. Not unless it’s absolutely necessary.

Before she can make good on that, however, several things happen at once and all hell seems to break loose as the ground beneath their feet shakes.

It takes her a second to realize what is happening, but once she does, her heart is thumping so hard it is making her dizzy. The walls shake, everything sways back and forth, things fall and shatter.

“Everyone! Drop, cover, and hold! Stay calm, get on your— Ugh!” As the ground shakes again, shakes harder, Andrea drops to her knees and crawls towards the nearest desk, covering her head with her hand.

It’s Kara’s desk, of course, and whether she likes it or not, she doesn’t have a choice about it. The space under the desk is cramped, but she can’t possibly make it anywhere else, not without risking her own safety.

The ground shakes and slides violently. Everything— furniture, pens, staplers, tablets, lamps, plants, and the ground— is moving in all directions. The earthquake shakes the windows, breaks the glass, and Andrea feels her heart jump into her throat. There it sits and quivers like a terrified animal, effectively blocking the scream that keeps bubbling up again and again but can’t find its way out.

Tucking her legs tighter under her body and keeping her head down, Andrea makes herself as small as she possibly can. The metal she is holding onto for dear life is cool and slippery against her palm, and the noise filling her ears is horrible. It’s a jet engine at full power, roaring at a strange distance but all around them at the same time. It’s things falling and breaking. It’s scared voices. It’s screaming. It is the sound of sirens, coming from what feels like a million miles away.

The ground won’t calm down for longer than milliseconds. It just doesn’t stop. She can barely catch her breath.

There’s a metallic crash near her. Something solid and heavy.

Andrea’s stomach lurches, adrenaline pumps, and she wants to scream to let out all the tension that's building inside her, but no sound comes out. It’s just shallow, rapid breathing. It’s getting deeper and faster, and she needs it to stop before she works herself into a state; before she works herself up into something she won’t be able to snap out of again without help.

“Miss Rojas?” Kara’s voice breaks her anxious focus. “Are you okay?”

She wants to laugh. She wants to snap. She wants to glare at the other woman, who is so close to her, Andrea can feel the heat radiating off her as if it's coming off her body in waves.

She glances up, but her eyes are unfocused, her vision slightly blurry, and her eyes are already playing tricks on her. She slams them shut again, part of her questioning why her brain would come up with the mental image of Kara Danvers— sweet, cardigan-clad Kara Danvers— holding up the desk over their heads with one hand, easily, as if it were made out of plastic, her fingers splayed out against white varnish.

Andrea keeps her eyes closed, dimly wondering why it feels like Kara’s warmth is wrapping itself around her like a blanket, before declaring herself temporarily insane. It’s the lack of oxygen to her brain. It’s her vivid imagination. She is losing her mind.

She keeps her eyes closed, tries to control her breathing.

And, at long last, the shaking stops.

The ground is finally still. Up is up and down is down again.

People crawl out from under their hiding places; out from under the rubble. The sight that awaits them— awaits _her_ — is ugly and broken, and Andrea covers her mouth as she staggers to her feet.

The bullpen is covered in dust and debris. Furniture, office supplies, papers, the brand new tech she only just brought in for everyone to use _last week_.

Biting back a manic giggle and a considerate amount of bile, Andrea won’t even allow herself to go anywhere near the numbers waiting to be crunched in her head.

Her eyes roam over the deep cracks, follow the fissures climbing the walls like poison ivy, and she can’t think about it. Think about the damage done to the building. _Her_ building. She can’t think about CatCo or Obsidian, only one floor down from them and probably in shambles. She can’t think about it— not if she wants to keep her breathing in check, her breakfast down, or her trembling legs from giving right out from under her.

Everything is eerily still and silent. Around the bullpen, people stand rigidly, as if afraid that any motion, any sound, might be dangerous. Some of them have lifted their heads, turned them to look at her for instructions on what to do next, but Andrea can’t think, let alone speak.

“Miss Rojas? Miss Rojas, you’re hurt. You’re… bleeding.”

It’s Kara again, but Andrea can’t look at her. She can’t move. She can barely hear her over the storm brewing in her chest and the ringing noise swelling in her ears. And even when she does, it takes her a ridiculously long time to _really_ hear her, her brain unable to process anything else, anything _more_.

“I— what?”

“You are hurt,” Kara says again, slowly, but it doesn’t make any sense. She doesn’t feel hurt. She is fine. “Your legs, Miss Rojas, um—”

When she looks down and sees the blood trickling down her shins, heat erupts on her neck and a sick, heavy feeling fills her stomach. The blood is warm and sticky, and pooling in her right shoe; and it isn’t all that much— she has seen and had worse, after all— but for a crazy second, Andrea is convinced she can _smell_ it, something salty and sharp biting her nose, and that’s enough to finally make her stumble.

“Oh, whoops. Okay, alright.” Kara’s grip is firm on her arm— much firmer than one might expect— and her other hand is warm on the small of Andrea’s back as she keeps her from falling backwards or toppling over. “You're going to be okay. Just… breathe.”

Confused and irritated, Andrea feels her eyebrows knit together. She _is_ breathing. And she is _fine_. She doesn’t need Kara Danvers telling her that.

She isn’t that worried about the cuts on her legs. She’s worried about the state of her businesses and her building. And she’s worried about her people. All her employees, and her driver, and the sweet lady— Maria— who cleans her apartment on Tuesdays. And—

Andrea’s head whips around so fast, something in her neck locks and shoots white-hot pain into her system, making her eyes water.

“Lena!” She pants out.

She needs to know Lena is okay. She needs to know she isn’t hurt.

She staggers over to the desk, any desk, and picks up the phone. The line is dead— of course— the only sound her own ragged breathing.

Touching a hand to her forehead, Andrea leans against the desk. She can’t panic. She needs to keep it together, needs to think before she acts. She can’t run around looking like a headless chicken in heels. No matter the state her workplace is in right now, she’s still at work. She has responsibility. She has a name to live up to. She can’t—

“Miss Rojas?” Kara gently pries the receiver out of her hand and hangs up, unnecessarily. “All the lines are dead. The power is out in most parts of the city.”

Andrea feels herself nod.

“I’m sure Le— Miss Luthor is okay. L-Corp has all these little... panic rooms? All over the place? She… She’s built them herself, so—”

“She’s okay,” Andrea finishes the thought, quietly, as the feeling returns to her toes. With it, however, comes pain, and she winces when it licks up her legs with an unexpected fiery fierceness. It’s not that bad, not really, but it still takes her by surprise. So much so, she doesn’t even protest when Kara carefully maneuvers her into a chair.

“Wait here,” Kara says, and Andrea doesn’t take orders from anyone, but she might just follow this one. Sitting in the chair, in the middle of all the chaos, she’s suddenly bone-tired. She’s exhausted, and her body is cold, and she just wants to go home and forget today ever happened.

She closes her eyes for a moment, takes a huge breath.

When she opens them again, her eyes stay on Kara. They follow her as she walks and stops, stoops down, walks and stops again. She picks up chairs and plants, and helps people to their feet. She lingers to talk to them, calms them down. Her steady hands rest on arms and shoulders and backs, rub reassuring circles or squeeze gently.

Andrea watches the muscles in Kara’s back work as she moves a fallen steel cabinet out of the way. She isn’t doing it alone, but the girl who has hurried over to help hardly looks like she could bench press 150 pounds of steel either.

Nia, Andrea corrects herself. The girl is Nia Nal. One of her cub reporters. And, apparently, she is much stronger than she looks.

They are helpers. Kara and Nia are helpers.

Now that her heart rate has slowed down and the fog in her brain has cleared at least somewhat, Andrea can spot a couple more amongst her staff. They are looking after their own— handing out water, patching up minor injuries, offering support where it is needed. Some have started to clean up the glass on the floor. Others are carefully sifting through the mess to look for salvageable treasures, carefully setting them back on desks and shelves.

The screaming and the panic are gone. People are talking in low voices, determined efficiency humming all around her in a calming register. And like honeybees to flowers, everyone seems to be drawn to Kara Danvers. 

They look to Kara for comfort, for calm, for guidance; gauging, recalibrating, copying what they are seeing. Andrea can see it clearly, but she’s also one hundred percent sure the others cannot. They don’t even realize. They can’t see it. They don’t know.

But she does.

She knows more than any conversation with Kara might have told her. She knows with absolute certainty.

And she knows Lena. 

As she sees Kara coming towards her— a sweet smile on her lips and strong arms cradling a first-aid kit like it’s a newborn lamb— Andrea almost laughs. Of course. This explains everything. It explains Lena (oh, they are going to have _words_ ). It explains Kara. And it perfectly explains the off vibes that have been bothering her for weeks now.

“Sorry it took so long.” Kara sets the kit down, and kneels in front of her, her smile still firmly in place as she looks up at her from the floor, and Andrea is pretty sure her brain just blew a fuse. “Let’s have a look?”

Her heart thuds a little harder than normal, she chalks it up to the pain in her cut up legs, and refuses to examine anything any closer.

Watching Kara saturating a cotton ball with the antiseptic, her chest grows warm in anticipation, and she hastily fixes her gaze on that vintage-looking, comforting brown bottle of hydrogen peroxide, ignoring the nervous excitement fluttering through her as Kara reaches for her leg and places her foot in her lap. Pointy heel, blood, and all.

“This might sting a bit. Sorry.”

She feels the heat in Kara’s hands on her leg, feels her palm press against her calf, and Andrea can’t escape her gaze any longer. Kara holds her there, and everything slows.

Watching her face carefully, Kara squeezes her cotton ball over her cuts, and Andrea is experiencing the sharp fizzing sensation everywhere—her legs, her arms, her fingers, her toes—like the way the rushing warmth of a hot shower hits you all at once.

When she shifts slightly, Kara’s fingers move to the soft skin at the back of her knee, and Andrea tries not to shiver. She blinks, rapidly, batting her eyelashes at the young woman kneeling at her feet, and tries to jerk her leg up and away reflexively, but Kara’s clever hands anticipate the move, and Andrea folds easily, yields to the firm, warm grip and the delicious sting that is still humming against her skin.

Kara carefully slides her heel off, examines her foot, and wipes it with a cool wipe that makes it burn.

“Big breath,” she says, and Andrea takes the deepest breath her lungs can handle without even thinking about it.

There is a surge of pain as Kara pulls glass from her foot. There’s burning and more blood. There’s the heat of swelling flesh and the dull throb of her heartbeat pulsing in the wound, and Andrea can’t hold back the whimper that parts her lips without permission.

“You okay?”

Andrea looks down at her leg, at the deep slashes in her shin that suddenly feel like they have cut to the bone (they haven’t, she would know). She’s sure she is blushing, as heat creeps up her neck, and she tries her hardest not to look back, even though she can feel Kara’s heavy, concerned gaze on her.

“Miss Rojas? Hey, can you look at me?”

She waits another couple seconds, then looks up and opens her mouth to speak. She doesn’t know exactly what she is going to say, doesn’t know at all, actually, and this whole _whatever-this-is_ between them is starting to feel much too close for comfort. She should have thanked Kara for the kit and taken care of her cuts herself. Even if her hands are too shaky and her head is swimming a little. It wouldn’t have been the first time.

“I— _ehh_... ” Andrea swallows hard.

Before she can get any of the words out, Kara’s hand lands on her knee, giving it a quick, reassuring squeeze. She smiles down at it, then meets her eyes again. Kara’s hair is pushed back into a ponytail, but flyaways frizz around her face, and the black-rimmed glasses she always wears drift slightly down her freckled nose.

“We’re almost done. You’re… doing great. Good job.”

Kara is warm milk and honey, going down Andrea’s raw, scratchy throat like medicine. A deep heat rises in her from the pit of her stomach all the way to her cheeks. It gathers and simmers low, and all Andrea can do not to give voice to it and have her shaky voice betray her confusion, is to bite her tongue. Literally.

She lets Kara bind a wad of Kleenex wrapped in a layer of gauze to her foot with medical tape. Listens to her talk the whole time without truly hearing a single word.

Kara doesn’t seem to mind or notice, she’s busy wrapping gauze firmly— not tightly— around her foot, wrapping her lightly from ankle to toes. Her bandaging skills are as good, or perhaps even slightly better than her own, and Andrea wonders about that, wonders who has taught her and why. Kara Danvers is a reporter, yes, but she’s hardly Christiane Amanpour.

“There,” Kara says, admiring her work. “This should be better?”

“Thank you,” Andrea says, a little bit surprised by just how soft her voice is. It’s downright downy. “I didn’t even—” She purses her lips, nods, and makes to get up from her chair, readying herself to put tentative weight on her injured foot, but Kara holds her back.

“Oh! Wait.”

Before Andrea can comment, Kara has torn through her kit again and plastered her legs in a wild criss-cross pattern. The plaster is supposed to be skin-colored, but the shade doesn’t quite match, and, for some reason, it is this insignificant detail that finally loosens her grip on sanity, pries her fingers from it one strange stripe at a time until she can’t contain her laughter anymore. It bubbles up and foams over, spills out in tiny bursts that warm her cheeks.

Kara joins in good-naturedly. She flashes her a million-megawatt smile that takes Andrea’s breath away so suddenly, it gets tangled up with her laughter, and both get stuck somewhere in her throat. She coughs and clears it. And when she looks again, that million-megawatt smile is still crackling at full voltage.

“Sorry. Best I could do,” Kara says, splashes of pink creating a pretty backdrop for the splatter of freckles on her cheeks and nose.

“Thank you,” Andrea says again, her voice slightly firmer this time, even when she feels a little wobbly. “Thank you for your help, Kara.” She wants to say more, but isn’t sure how to facilitate the conversation that she would like to have. It goes against her very nature, breaks quite a few rules, and would also violate Lena’s trust. And that trust isn’t something easily regained, if lost.

She looks down at her shoes on the floor. Her blood has seeped into the leather, leaving the elegant black-and-white stained with rusty brown. They are ruined. And even if they weren’t, the liberal amount of gauze around her right foot would make it impossible to put them back on anyway. Also, there’s probably more glass shards in there somewhere.

And how come she hadn’t noticed the glass in the first place, Andrea wonders. There should have been pain. Sharp flashes of it. But she hasn’t felt it. She walked on glass and didn’t feel a thing.

“I… I have a spare pair of flats in my bag. You could… um, if you wanted to, I mean. They might fit,” Kara offers. She looks around, her eyes scanning the floor. “If… I can find my bag.”

She couldn't conjure up a new pair of shoes from her little first-aid kit for her, so of course, Kara Danvers goes for the next best thing. It’s an endearing quality and it’s a little worrisome too. Usable, exploitable even. And Andrea would say no, but as footwear, the gauze doesn’t have a chance of lasting through even a very slow walk back to her office, so it isn’t like she has much of a choice. 

“Kara. You really don’t have to—”

“Oh, I don’t mind.” Kara pauses looking for her bag, her eyebrows drawing down into a frown unexpectedly. “They’re not… They’re nothing fancy, though,” she adds after a moment, her tone almost apologetic, and Andrea wants to laugh, wondering what Kara would say if she rocked up to CatCo in her old, ratty bathrobe, barefaced and barefoot, with her best bedhead one morning. She’s only human. And she doesn’t care if those flats have rhinestones or glitter glue on them. They just need to get her from A to B.

“I don’t think I could handle fancy right now.” Andrea smiles, and Kara returns her smile with interest.

“Right,” she says. “It’s probably best if… you keep your weight off that foot as much as possible?”

It’s as much an instruction as it is a question, and paired with the stern glint in Kara’s steely-blue eyes, it flutters in Andrea’s stomach like a thing with feathers.

“Mmhm. I’ll be careful.”

Satisfied, Kara nods, then goes back to hunting up her bag until she runs it to ground and holds it up with a squeal of delight. She rummages for a moment, finally producing a pair of flats. And, despite her previous nonchalance, Andrea is secretly relieved to find they are a simple, shiny black affair. No rhinestones and no glitter glue. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ... Thoughts? 😊
> 
> * * *
> 
> Not a lot of Spanish in this one, despite it being Andrea POV. Explanations are probably not needed, everything is self-explanatory, but for the sake of completeness:
> 
>  **Andrea <> English** in this chapter:
> 
>   * estrella de mar — starfish
>   * eh(h) — interjection. Hesitation marker. Used (as inelegantly) as an English-speaker would use ‘uh’ or ‘um’. Famous example: see [Diego Maradona](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W5rrtENGGak) — though Andrea is nowhere near this level of… whatever that is. 🤣
> 



	9. Tidal Wave

It’s the evening. Somehow, miraculously, the day is finally coming to a close. Lena couldn’t be more glad about it. She is exhausted. The stress of a natural disaster on top of a busy work day will do that to a person. From what she has gathered, L-Corp hasn’t been hit quite as badly as CatCo and Obsidian have, and her heart nearly gave out when Andrea came home all banged up, but they haven’t talked about it. Something about the way Andrea carries herself makes it unmistakably clear that she doesn’t want to do that, and Lena knows her well enough not to push it.

She still worries, though.

As the sun sets over National City, spreading a warm orange blanket over all of them as if to tuck them in, whispering a gentle apology through cracked windows and half-drawn blinds or curtains, they have settled on the couch. Lena has made tea and gotten out the funny little round biscuits that Andrea likes, but, so far, they have touched neither.

They just lie there.

Lena is snuggled up to Andrea, watching her intently as Andrea watches the TV. The volume is low— so low it’s almost annoying, but Lena doesn’t comment on it. She knows Andrea doesn’t like loud noises after a long day. Also, she’s already doing her best to block out the moving pictures, the news of the earthquake’s aftermath, and having the news anchor’s voice talk barely above a whisper helps with that. As does keeping her back turned and her eyes firmly trained on Andrea’s face.

However, even as she watches the crease at Andrea’s brow, focusing on it hard enough that her fingers itch to trace the scar above the bridge of her nose, Lena can’t actually get away from the news coverage at all. She knows what they are saying; what pictures they are showing. And if she were looking, a sea of red and blue would swim in her eyes and drown her.

It’s Kara. Everything is Kara. And inside her chest, her heart is curling up into itself.

She can even see Kara on Andrea’s face. The awe, the admiration. It’s like sunlight reflecting off something beautiful directly in her line of vision. It’s stinging her eyes and blinding her momentarily. Lena almost looks away, wants to cover her eyes with her hand to protect them, but then stops and holds herself there when she spots something else blooming on Andrea’s features: determination.

It clashes horribly with the fascination, edging it further and further away until all that’s left is Andrea’s thinking face. Her _don’t-fuck-with-me-while-I’m figuring-shit-out_ face. Lena knows that face like her own skin, and the possible implications run down her spine like ice cubes.

She opens her mouth to say something, to break Andrea’s concentration perhaps, or to cheer her on— Lena isn’t exactly sure which— when Andrea turns up the volume.

‘ _As power returns to the city, Supergirl and Dreamer work side by side with first responders and the authorities—_ ’

Yeah, no. Lena doesn’t want to hear it. Fighting the urge to cover her ears and hum to herself— and loudly, she shifts and rolls over. She needs to get up off the couch and out of the room, but she isn’t fast enough. She’s only just managed to sit up, when her eyes latch onto red boots, crawl up a blue bodysuit, and get tangled up in blonde hair. They find the smile stretching Kara’s face, and the effect is immediate.

Her eyes tear, her cheeks flush, and she sits up straighter. Her heart thuds so hard, she’s sure even Andrea should be able to hear it.

Kara’s cape flutters in the wind. It ruffles her hair playfully, and, even objectively speaking, Kara looks stunning on camera— the sculpted body, the unblemished skin, that sweet, _wretched_ smile that hits Lena right in the chest, tightening it until she can’t breathe.

She wants to look away. She wants to turn off the TV.

She can’t do either. Her body won’t move, and Andrea is hogging the remote.

For the head of a Fortune 500 tech company, Andrea’s penthouse is infuriatingly offline. She doesn’t like to talk to her TV or any of the home appliances. Nothing is ‘smart’ in Andrea’s home— except for the heating system. She can control the temperature with her phone. And the lights have motion sensors. But that’s about it.

The TV is online now too, occasionally, because Lena has whined long and hard enough about wanting to watch her favorite Netflix show with Andrea, but it’s still strictly remote-controlled only. And judging by the look of intense concentration on Andrea’s face, there is no way in hell Lena will get her hands on that remote or whine her way into getting what she wants. She has to try anyway.

“Can you turn that off?”

Andrea is chewing on her thumbnail and not looking at her. Lena nudges her hip.

“Hey, could you turn that off, _please_?”

Andrea’s eyes stay on the screen. “Why?”

Lena groans internally. Why can’t Andrea do as she is asked. Just this once. Why does she always have to question _everything_. 

“ _Because_.”

She knows the word and her bratty tone are a mistake, but she can’t help it. She just wants the torture to end and Kara out of her sight and ears and brain; and the longer Andrea takes to meet her request, the longer she will suffer.

“You will have to give me a reason,” Andrea says, her voice calm, but one eyebrow lifting dangerously as she peels her attention off Kara and hefts it on Lena instead. It wraps itself around her from head to toe. Lena can feel the extra weight like she could a pair of soaking wet jeans.

“I… don’t like it.”

She knows she is skirting around the truth like a figure skater. A skater on thin ice.

Andrea’s lips pinch with disapproval. She sits up slowly, and her free hand goes to her hip. She sighs. “That’s an opinion, not a reason.”

Lena wants to scream. Of all the things to pick a fight over, does it really have to be the TV? And does it have to be Kara? She could have left the room before she opened her mouth, and it wouldn’t have been a big deal, but now that option is off the table. Andrea won’t let her wriggle her way out of the conversation. The glint in her eyes tells Lena as much, and it has her bite the inside of her cheek hard enough so she doesn’t say something she will regret later.

“It makes me… _nervous_ , alright?”

Andrea shakes her head, and Lena feels herself pout like a willful child. What is it that Andrea wants from her? What is she supposed to— _bloody_ — say?!

“That’s a reaction, Lena.”

Oh, fuck Andrea and her fucking semantics.

In a last desperate effort, Lena presses her forehead into Andrea’s shoulder with a small whimper, her hand searching for Andrea’s and moving it away from her hip.

Andrea intertwines her fingers with her own. They lock hands. And Lena almost believes she has done it, has derailed Andrea’s train of thought and benched the conversation that she doesn’t want to have, but when Andrea squeezes her hand maybe a little too hard, she knows she has managed to do exactly nothing.

“Lena?”

Lena mumbles against Andrea’s shoulder. She doesn’t want to face this— Andrea, the TV, Kara. She can’t do it.

“Can you give me a reason?” Andrea asks.

Her voice is soft, oh so unbearably soft, and it’s this— out of all the things that are wrong with her present predicament— that sends Lena spiraling. She jerks back and jumps to her feet, stands there for a moment, lost in the empty space between the couch and the coffee table, with her eyes going back and forth between Andrea and Kara on the TV screen.

“I— I, um…”

“We are having this conversation, Lena.” Andrea’s voice is still gentle, but there's a firm, slightly impatient undercurrent now. She drops the remote, pats the couch with both hands, and looks at Lena expectantly.

Lena shakes her head. Absolutely not. And Andrea can’t make her. No matter how hard she pushes. And push she will.

“Lena...” Andrea shifts, leans forward, and reaches for her, and suddenly Kara’s voice fills the living room, booming and omnipresent.

 _‘It’s not me_ ,' she says. _'It’s the wonderful citizens of National City. It’s everyone. Everyone doing their best, doing their part to fix what has been broken, to rebuild—’_

Lena feels like a pressure cooker with no relief valve.

“No! This is not okay!” she screeches, then runs—as best she can on those damn non-slip fuzzy socks—across the living room and into the bathroom. She locks the door. “Don’t come after me! I’m warning you,” she calls, as she hears Andrea groan and follow. Slowly.

Lena waits, with bated breath. She refuses to feel bad for making Andrea get off the couch. She doesn’t have to do that, does she? She can stay in the living room. Lena just… She needs a minute.

Andrea tries the handle, then knocks.

“Let me in, Lena,” she says. “¿ _Me estás jodiendo_? Come on!”

“Leave me alone!”

“Lena, _cuchá, entiendo que estés_ —”

“Go away!” Lena looks around the room. For what, she doesn’t know. Maybe something to hold onto. Maybe something to throw. “I’m… I am going to drown myself in the bathtub!”

Okay. She knows it’s a stupid thing to say. It’s silly and childish, and she doesn’t even mean it. It’s as if they’re seventeen again, suddenly. And it’s not about that, or about the bathtub, or about anything, really. She just wants— no, she _needs_ Andrea to understand that she’s serious about this. That she means it when she says she doesn’t want to talk. Maybe throwing a tantrum and locking herself in the bathroom isn’t the best way to go about it, exactly; perhaps it's quite the opposite, she muses, but it’s too late now. It is where they are at.

Andrea laughs.

“Oh! Don’t laugh!” Lena hollers. “This is not funny!”

“It’s a little funny.”

Lena makes a face at the closed door, then sinks down on the edge of the bathtub. Outside there’s quiet Spanish cursing, followed by a muffled thud.

“I’m sitting against the door now,” Andrea says. “Warn me if you’re going to open it. I don’t want to crack my head open.”

Lena looks down at the white tiles. “Okay.” Her mouth is closing in on the word, making the sound small.

On the other side of the door, she hears Andrea sigh.

It’s silent for a moment.

It is what Lena has wanted— a chance to breathe— but silence feeds fear and makes it colossal. She can’t handle that either. Instead, she gets up and pulls the towels from the cabinet, beginning to build herself a towel nest with them in the bathtub.

“I’m not entirely sure why you are freaking out,” Andrea says. “What’s going on? What is it about… Supergirl—?”

Lena doesn’t answer. Andrea’s open question is running laps in her head and lapping itself until she feels dizzy. She keeps adding towels to the tub, then paces back and forth like a trapped creature in a too-small cage.

It’s not about Supergirl. Not really. It’s about Kara. And Lena hates herself a little for still making a distinction where there is none. Kara _is_ Supergirl.

Thinking about Kara is like picking at scabs until they bleed.

Thinking about Kara hurts. She feels it in her shoulders, in her chest, in her heart. Every time it contracts, the pain of nights spent crying so hard her whole body would ache in the mornings floods the space behind her ribcage. It’s the very same pain now; that deep ache permeating all the muscle fibers like acid. Lena clutches for it, puts a hand over her heart to calm it down, but it doesn’t help. Beneath her hand is an injury that’s never fully healed, a pulled muscle that will never work the same again. The heart _is_ a muscle, after all. And hers has been through enough.

She throws more towels into the tub.

Kara is a wound. A festering wound that just won’t close. Maybe she needs to rip the bandaid off, let it breathe. Maybe she needs to look at it. But she can’t. 

“I’m not talking about it!” she announces to the door, but her words are met with more silence. “Drea, you hear me? _Please_.”

Still no answer. She hears Andrea move.

“One thing,” Andrea says finally. “Tell me one thing.”

Lena almost cries. It’s an old game. It actually goes ‘ _Tell me one thing and I’ll drop it_ ’— but Andrea never actually says the second part. She doesn’t have to, because it usually works in her favor. Lena tells her one thing, and then a million others just come tumbling out right after, and they do the exact opposite of dropping it.

It’s a game, an invitation, an offer. It’s Andrea meeting her halfway. She would drop it, if she had to. If one thing was all Lena had to say on the matter.

But playing about Supergirl? About Kara? Lena would spill her guts. All across the pristine, white floor. She would scoop herself out using both hands, dig it all up, make a right royal mess. She wouldn’t stop until she was an empty shell, nothing but hollow skin.

No. She can’t risk it. 

“No,” she says, even when she wants to say yes. Oh, she wants to say yes. She needs to say yes, and every other word that would follow, if she let them. She’s bloated with words; they are everywhere; floating, burning, threatening to claw their way to the surface, ripping her open from the inside out. And she can’t hold it together much longer.

Telling Andrea would mean telling her everything. And she can’t do that, can she?

Kara’s secret isn’t hers to tell. The damn secret that was kept from her _specifically_. The damn secret that was kept from her for so long, it makes her sick to her stomach to count all the days in her head. 852 days. Two years, seven months, and nine days.

It’s not about the secret. Not anymore.

Keeping her secret from Lena makes Kara a liar. But if Lena told it to Andrea, that would make her a traitor. It would make her like Lillian, like Lex. It would make her a Luthor. Luthors deal in blood money and secrets, after all. No, she won’t stoop that low. She can’t. Even when parts of her want to. The part that is hurt. And another that is so furious, so furious _with Kara_ , it scares her to her toes to even look at it.

“Are you sure?” Andrea prompts.

Lena strides to the door, presses her palm against it, touches the handle and the lock, retreats.

She blows out her cheeks. “It’s… complicated.”

“You told me that before. Same exact words.”

Of course. Of course Andrea remembers. She has layered her words, traced their outlines, and found that they match. Damn her perceptiveness. Damn her attentive ears. Damn that annoyingly infallible memory. 

Lena doesn’t know what else to say. She climbs into her towel nest and curls up.

Time passes in a numb fog. Maybe seconds, maybe minutes. At one point, she pinches her arm— going for the darkest bruise on purpose— hoping that it will remind her how feelings feel. It doesn’t work. It only makes her eyes leak.

She lies in the tub, motionless.

Like worrying a loose tooth, her mind keeps returning to Kara. It keeps running its tongue over the parts that hurt the most, over the jagged edges, making her wince and shudder.

She’s touching it, and touching it, and touching it. The bandaid comes off, leaving her raw and pink and vulnerable.

“Lena?”

Lena sniffles, buries her face in a soft towel. She takes a deep breath. Then her next words tumble out so fast, she’s almost screaming them. They hang in the air for a moment, bouncing off the walls.

“It… _hurts_ , okay?!”

Her voice cracks, her breathing hiccups, and she bites her lip to keep from sobbing. She’s only partially successful. Her cheeks are wet. She sinks back into her towels.

“Lenita? Please open the door,” Andrea says, a vein of urgency in her voice. “Please let me come in there with you, _corazón_.”

Lena sits up and leans her head against the cool edge of the tub. She closes her eyes. “It’s unlocked,” she rasps from her towel nest. “You can come in.”

The door creaks open.

When she opens her eyes again, Andrea is sitting on the edge of the bathtub. She is running her fingers through her hair, gently removing any tangles.

“Bad air out,” she says, lightly scratching her scalp with her fingernails, and Lena obeys, releasing a long, shuddering sigh. The kind that comes from deep within and completely empties her lungs. “Good air in.”

Lena takes a huge breath. It hurts.

“You unlocked it?” Andrea asks softly. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

Lena shrugs, barely lifting one shoulder.

“I’m here.”

Lena almost can’t handle the way she says it, so simple and bare. Andrea looks at her. Her face is naked too. Like her voice. On her features is the perfect balance of concern and support, but there is something else there too.

She looks so tired. The sight pricks Lena’s skin, leaving tiny holes behind all over.

Andrea swings her legs over the edge, and, pressing her lips together, carefully climbs into the tub behind her. She lowers herself down and opens her legs for Lena to settle between them and lean back against her.

Lena bites her lip. “I’m sorry I snapped at you.”

“That’s not what this is about, _mi amor_ ,” Andrea says, as Lena settles in. “I just want to hold you for a minute.”

Andrea’s hands wrap around her middle and her chin rests on her shoulder. She nuzzles it, then plants a soft kiss on it. Her thumbs are rubbing reassuring circles on Lena’s belly.

“Okay.”

Lena allows herself to relax, to sink against Andrea and melt further into the embrace. She sighs and takes another breath. It smells soapy and a little bit sweet, with the faintest hint of rubbing alcohol trailing behind it like an afterthought.

Andrea’s arms around her tighten, and Lena closes her eyes. They stay there, silently, for long minutes. Eventually, Andrea’s hand slides down to her thigh and she gives it a gentle squeeze.

“Are you okay?” she asks.

“I couldn’t… I’m sorry! It’s... ” Lena trails off, licks her lips. She has already said this. “ _Lo… Lo que pasa es que... es un tema muy… delicado, ¿viste?_ ” Her tongue stumbles over the words like they’re warm, smooth pebbles in her mouth. She hasn’t spoken Spanish in years. Not like this. Not with… and certainly not about… but it works. She finds it hurts less too.

Andrea’s breath is warm against her shoulder. “Mmhm. _Bueno, mirá... sólo intento ayudar_.”

She twists her body to look at Andrea. Oh, she knows that. But that doesn’t make it any easier. If only she knew what to do.

Lena feels a single tear escape. It rolls down her cheek, cold and wet, until Andrea’s soft, warm lips catch it. She draws back slightly, then kisses her cheek again, and Lena’s heart gives a groggy little thud-thud. 

“I can’t kiss it better, if you don’t tell me where it hurts?”

‘Everywhere’ dies on the tip of Lena’s tongue. It is hot in her mouth, pungent, and it burns her throat as she swallows it.

More tears fall. “I know.”

“Whenever you’re ready,” Andrea whispers, her breath a warm caress on Lena’s cheek. Her hands, mindful of Lena’s tender bruises, move gently down her arms before covering her hands with hers, and linking their fingers together.

Ready?— Lena feels like she will never be ready. She will never be prepared for a reality in which the most important person in her life has betrayed her, has destroyed her.

Again.

She doesn’t care about Supergirl, but it is losing Kara that still feels like a gaping hole in her chest. She doesn’t understand how someone she cares so deeply about— and who she _thought_ cared about her too— could do this. Hurt her so much; rip her apart, rip her limb from limb.

But Kara _has_ done it. And so has Andrea.

Maybe the problem here is her. Maybe love is supposed to be this way. But, if this _is_ love, Lena isn’t sure she wants it. She won’t survive it a third time.

“You are safe. You are loved. You are strong.” Andrea murmurs the affirmations into her skin. They glow, and tingle, and sink deep. She rocks them a little.

Andrea is gentle and she is patient. She waits. She waits like a person knowing _exactly_ what they are waiting for.

Lena sighs. “Supergirl. You know, don’t you?”

“Know what?”

“Drea, please.”

There is a pause.

“Do you need me to say it? Say it for you? Would that help?”

“Yes, please.”

Lena feels her heart shudder. Her mouth is dry. Tension creeps into her body— her jaw, her neck, her shoulders. Everything is in knots.

“Kara Danvers is Supergirl.”

Lena freezes. She has almost expected it, but the words still strike a nerve. They are everything that is wrong with her world. They are Kara. They are Lex. And they are more pain than she could possibly be expected to contain.

“And… and I think she… broke your heart?”

She feels her face twist. A lump begins in her throat and grows rapidly until it comes out as a sob. She doesn’t hold it back, she breaks. Breaks with pain running down her cheeks in a deluge of tears.

“Shh. Shh, Lenita. Shh.” Andrea’s arms are around her like a lifebelt, keeping her from drowning. “I'm here. I got you. You're going to be okay. Breathe. It’s okay. It’s okay.”

Wrought-up with grief, Lena slumps back against Andrea. She weeps as though floodgates in her heart and soul have been opened. Violent sobs racking her whole body, she gives in to the pain, the fear, the anger, letting all the emotional turmoil wash over her. At the heart of it all, sitting in the eye of the storm, is the sting of betrayal; the bitter ache of a loneliness so desperate and so old, it has grown right along with her.

She covers her face with her hands, and her sobs are quickly honeycombed with hiccups and hysteria.

“Where have you been? Why weren’t you there?!” She sobs, uncontrolled and unrestrained, her flailing hands grasping for a lifeline and latching onto any part of Andrea that they can find. She doesn’t know whether she is asking her, or Kara, or a higher power that she doesn’t actually believe in. “I— I _need_ you! I want to stop feeling like this!”

She cries, and splutters, and hiccups. Her chest heaves. Her head hurts. She can’t get enough oxygen. The air around her is thick and empty, but she gulps it down anyway.

Andrea doesn’t speak, she lets her cry. She holds, and rocks, and caresses, quietly humming a sweet melody under her breath when her sobs have finally passed to sniffles.

“How long,” she asks in a hoarse whisper. “How long… will it hurt?”

“For as long as it takes,” Andrea answers.

Lena quiets down slowly. As she hiccups and sniffles, her mind goes blissfully numb. She feels almost okay now— safe for the building headache and the raw feeling in her chest, perhaps. She feels calm.

“Drea?”

“Yes?”

“Will you help me?” Lena tilts her head back to look at Andrea, then hiccups around the thumb that has somehow snuck into her mouth and is pressing against her front teeth. She doesn’t bother removing it. 

Andrea smiles, the blueness of her eyes glowing bright. “Anything you need, _mi corazón_.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So that’s where we’re at, folks. 😊 ... Thoughts?
> 
> * * *
> 
> A pinch of Spanish this time. I already cut a lot. Here’s what still made the final cut:
> 
>  **Andrea/(Lena) <> English** in this chapter:
> 
>   * ¿Me estás jodiendo? — Are you fucking kidding me? 
>   * “Lena, cuchá, entiendo que estés—” — “Lena, listen, I understand that you’re (possibly) —” (present subjunctive, there is a doubt)
>   * “Lo que pasa es que... es un tema muy… delicado, ¿viste?” — “The thing is… it is a very… delicate subject, you know?” 
>   * “Bueno, mirá... sólo intento ayudar.” — “Well, look, I’m… I’m just trying to help.” 
> 

> 
> I didn’t include the tried & tested endearments/pet names this time, since we already covered those before.


	10. Honey

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Before we start, have some [mood music](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pPnAFfYZ-bw)! 😎

It could be worse. It could be a hell of a lot worse. It also could be better.

Watching the men in the blue jumpsuits and yellow hardhats swarm around the bullpen like schools of strange, colorful fish, Andrea sighs. Her week has been a never ending stream of engineers, masons, and glaziers, and CatCo is nearly restored to its former glory. As is Obsidian. And, a few floors further down, the baristas are already sweeping the tiled floor of everyone’s favorite watering hole, almost ready to hand out caffeinated drinks and sugary treats, like your friendly neighborhood dealers in green aprons, on a daily basis once again.

Half of her wants to get up from behind her desk, jog down the many, many flights of stairs— the elevators are still out of order— and ask them nicely to make an exception and power up those shiny machines to fix her something strong and sweet; maybe even something overly indulgent— like a large Vanilla Bean Coconut Milk Latte.

As she pictures the warm, white cup and the feeling of her cold fingers wrapping around it, the ongoing live feed of numbers in her mind pauses, and her brain shifts gear to spit out an entirely different set of numbers altogether: numbers that measure caffeine, and fat content, sugars, and calories.

No, the drink is a bad idea.

And she doesn’t have time for bad ideas right now. Earthquake damage or not, there’s the next magazine issue needing to go to print on time. There’s wrangling digital into something fresh, eyeball-grabbing, and all-devices-friendly. There’s the next big launch that needs planning and prepping and overseeing. There’s that bug that needs fixing.

Obsidian Platinum has been a worldwide success. But if being successful has taught her anything, it is that there is no time to just sit and enjoy the view. It’s onwards and upwards, always. It’s putting on your running shoes first thing in the morning, every morning, and running up that hill at the crack of dawn. It’s feeling the burn in your muscles, your lungs rubbed raw, and your face stinging from the cold. It’s still smiling despite all that. It’s coming out on top, no matter what.

With her dear papá not being… as consistent as he used to be, it is on her, on Andrea, to keep a nice, strong hold on the reins at all times, making sure she’s shortened them enough so that she can feel this massive horse's mouth, maintain an even pressure, and give the right cues.

After years and years, she has this warped kind of horsemanship down to an art.

It’s all about management by perception, taking up the pressure just so, to a point that feels good for the horse. Not too much— that would kill morale and stifle productivity. But she also can’t leave the reins too loose. If she did, or if she dropped them— it would be a disaster.

The reins create space, sure, but you don’t just give it all away at once. Developing steady contact is key. And to do that, her hands need to be steady and her mind needs to stay sharp— no caffeine jitters or sugar highs.

She can’t slip up.

From this high up, hitting the ground would be deadly.

A cold shudder runs through her veins. Andrea squeezes her eyes shut for a beat, trying to keep unbidden images from entering her mind and flashing before her inner eye. She knows it could all be over in an unfortunate second; everything laid in ashes with one wrong move. She _knows_ , but she would rather not think about it.

All she has to do is not let things slip from her grasp, keep the leather supple, and pray that it will be enough.

Easy.

The weight on her shoulders is different from the heavy burden Supergirl carries, but part of her gets it. Gets it maybe a little _more_ than she likes to admit, even to herself.

Her monitor buzzes against her wrist, yanking Andrea away from her thoughts for a minute and reminding her to take a deep breath and get her heart rate back under control. She rolls her shoulders and sits up straighter, then takes a deliberate breath. And another. And a third. In her chest, her heart gives a little asynchronous stutter, then falls into step.

Bad air out, good air in.

Okay.

She reads her pulse and the time on the small screen, then opens her desk drawer and rummages in her bag for her phone. It’s already past lunch. High time to check in on Lena. They’re both ungodly busy these days, but Andrea will be damned if she lets Lena slip back into old, unhealthy habits on her watch. Lena can’t come here, and she can’t take a late lunch to her, but she can text— both Lena and her PA Jessica— and make sure Lena sees something green and nutritious before dinner.

Thinking about dinner, several of her heartstrings pull her in the direction of her papá’s _Locro_ , filling her with a deep longing for the thick, hearty, belly-warming soup. If she closes her eyes, she can almost feel the texture of white corn kernels and _porotos pallares_ in her mouth; taste the wonderful flavors of the stewing _osso buco_ , the _panceta salada_ , and the freshly-made _chorizo de cerdo_. She’d go all out and even put in the _mondongo_ and _patitas de cerdo_ — like it asks for in her _abuela_ ’s recipe— and then add liberal helpings of carrots, squash, potatoes, and sweet potatoes. The thought alone warms her from head to toe.

Lena would like it.

And she does have cumin, bay leaf, and _Chimichurri_ at home, doesn’t she? But, what she doesn’t have is time. Time for a home cooked meal, prepared with loving, patient hands. _Locro_ isn’t a thing that’s whipped up in 30 minutes or less. It takes time. Especially if you want it to go with some nice, crusty bread on the side too.

Andrea’s stomach grumbles in frustration. Fumbling with the bracelet around her wrist, she shifts in her seat and spins her chair to look out the window. It’s grey skies, nothing but grey stretching on endlessly. Her eyes are desperate for color— any color— as they roam over the dark, suffocating blanket of clouds hanging low and oppressive, but all there is is shades upon shades of grey.

Winter really isn’t her season. It’s cold and dark and wet, and the shadows are too long.

Something— _Someone_ — zooms past her tall windows in a blur of red and blue then, and her monitor complains again, briefly.

Andrea smiles. She knows she shouldn’t, but she does. Supergirl, Kara Danvers, is outperforming everyone this week. She’s sent in all her assignments before their due date and has even added a list of eleven pitches— all with sensational headlines and image options— ahead of tomorrow’s virtual staff meeting. And then she took off her reporter hat—well, that and her glasses— and put on her suit and cape.

Ever since finding out about her identity, and having it confirmed by Lena, Andrea’s respect for Kara Danvers has shot through the roof and plateaued somewhere above the clouds. She knows long days, Lena knows long days, but not like this. Kara Danvers might be super-human, but it's still extremely impressive.

Andrea is aware she isn’t supposed to feel this way about Kara— not as her boss and certainly not as Lena’s… girlfriend. She’s supposed to hate Kara, like Lena does.

Only, Lena doesn’t hate her— and that makes things potentially very, very complicated. Andrea should hate Kara for _that_ , if anything— for bringing disorder into her neatly planned, quiet, happy life— but she doesn’t do that either.

Lena is heartbroken. That much is obvious. As are her reasons for feeling so strongly about Kara and what she did and did not do.

Andrea is partially to blame for that. She’s the sharp shard of glass that’s been left behind in a patch of dry grass. She is what has focused Kara’s rays sufficiently to cause smouldering, followed by a full-scale blaze. She has started the fire, so to speak, and Kara and Lena’s friendship has burned to the ground within seconds because of her.

If it was that. A friendship.

That’s what Lena has called it, but, if anyone does, Andrea knows what a slippery slope an intense friendship with Lena can be. She has been there, and she isn’t quite as convinced as Lena that her feelings weren’t reciprocated.

She can’t tell either of them what they feel or how they might have felt. It’s not her place.

What she can do— what she _has to_ do— however, is try and fix it. By whichever means available to her, using any and all tricks in the book. All is fair in love and war, after all.

Only, Andrea isn’t completely convinced she _wants_ to? 

Yes, it is her fault that Lena couldn’t see beyond the betrayal and the pain. But, on the other hand, if she _had_ seen another way out, Andrea wouldn’t be here right now. She wouldn’t be in National City. She wouldn’t be back in Lena’s life. If Lena hadn’t wanted her here so badly, if she hadn’t _needed_ her, Andrea would be on the other side of the country right now. Perhaps, on the other side of the world.

So part of her is grateful— grateful to Kara— even when she is left stewing in overwhelming guilt for it.

She doesn’t want Lena hurt, of course not. And now that she is, she wants to help her heal. But what if healing comes at the price of what they have now, of what they are? Will she be big enough to let Lena go a second time, if she has to?

The thought pinches; her heart squeezes like a clenching fist, and Andrea focuses all her attention on the golden pair of scissors in her desktop organizer.

She has promised Lena that she is going to help. In whichever way she can, with whatever she’s got. And she meant it when she said it.

Now that Lena has filled in some of the blanks in the story, however, has gingerly handed her detail after detail like missing pieces of a fragile jigsaw puzzle, Andrea isn’t so sure anymore that that promise wasn’t premature. Now that she can almost see the whole picture, she isn’t so sure she even knows _how_ to help— even if she wants to.

Lena’s unconditional trust in her and her abilities sits heavy on her shoulders, draped over them like a weighted blanket for someone twice her size, and Andrea glances out of her window again, wondering.

How does Kara do it? Fly with the world’s expectations resting on her shoulders?

She wants to ask, but they’re not even on a first-name basis. She doesn’t know how many steps come between first names and secret identities, but Andrea is sure they are all very important and should not be skipped.

She would fast forward though, if she could. She’s never been good at making friends. Not real friends. Not friends _without_ benefits. Not—

Pushing to a stand, Andrea shakes her head. Pity party for one over. She is being ridiculous.

Yes, she has a whole truck-load of doubts that have been carefully sorted through, color-coded and cross-referenced for easy retrieval, because she’s been in therapy for more than half her life. Yes, she’s got issues. And those issues, at the most inconvenient of times, have a nasty habit of creeping into all aspects of her life, ranging from ‘Should I really eat all that bread?’ and ‘Do I really want to buy this expensive bag?’, to ‘Should I really enjoy spanking beautiful women on their pretty bare butts?’

But this isn’t about her. It’s about Lena. She needs to focus on Lena.

Only, she _is_ focusing on her. She is focusing so hard that her vision has gone blurry. Boiled down to the crux of the matter, the problem is this: She gets Lena. And she gets Kara. And she and her own crap are sitting smack-dab in the middle of the divide between the two.

She understands Kara shielding Lena from the dangerous parts of herself and her life to protect her. She gets why Lena is mad about it. And she also knows why it makes her feel so terribly uneasy. Even as she pretends she doesn’t think about it at all.

Striding over to the window, Andrea crosses her arms over her chest, bracing against the cold that seems to be radiating off the floor and walls all of a sudden.

Outside, the clouds have been punctured by an invisible needle, and rain has begun to fall. Gently still, at first, but as she stands and watches, it grows stronger and fiercer by the minute. Within the next five or so, the wind is picking up and grabbing fistfuls of rain with both hands, hurling it against the windows as hard as it can. It spits and curses, and Andrea feels something prickle at the nape of her neck.

Watching the rain, she shifts her weight from one leg to the other, then winces. She’s better but not fully healed. And she keeps forgetting it.

The sky is almost pitch-black and her office is mostly dark, only lit by the lamp in the corner and the dimmed one sitting on her desk.

Andrea doesn’t turn around. The reflection in the glass is quite enough to catch the light flickering and the growing shadows creeping across the floor, inching closer and closer towards her.

She freezes in place, swallows dryly, doesn’t move a muscle. Maybe, if she keeps exceptionally still, the darkness won’t find her and the shadows will pass her by.

Her skin buzzes, but it’s not her bracelet this time. It’s her whole body answering the sinister siren call of the shadows. If she wanted to, she could let it take over; let her body dissolve and sleepwalk into that dreamlike state that allows her to travel the in-between.

But she doesn’t _want_ to. She has never wanted to. She couldn’t want anything less.

The rain pounds the windows; the wind rattles the frames. It’s a continuous downpour. Water, nothing but water.

Andrea doesn’t know if it’s the rain, the lurking shadows, or the eerie silence ringing in her ears that has something icy line her stomach. The hairs on her arms and the back of her neck lift, and she can’t feign ignorance any longer. She takes a deep breath and whirls around on her uninjured heel, staring the darkness straight in the eye as she faces it.

She isn’t afraid of the dark.

Pursing her lips, she goes and wakes her computer from its peaceful slumber, clicks a few times— until the cheerful sounds of National City’s most popular radio station fill her office. It’s not really her taste in music. It’s too shrill and too in-your-face, but for now, it will do just fine.

She sits back down, crosses her legs. Her foot taps the air in time with the music.

The shadows can’t make her _do_ anything. They are nothing but a trick of the light. It’s not like they can reach out and grab her. All she has to do is to keep calm and wait for the clouds to part. The shadows don’t stand a chance against the sun.

The song ends, the news comes on, and by the time they have made it to the weather, Andrea’s mind has found something else to worry about.

It’s not just rain. It is torrential. And it has no intention of stopping anytime soon. The downpour is expected to continue, possibly well into the night— and if it does, it is going to flood basements and streets, drown electric and telephone lines, and possibly cost people their homes, their livelihoods, or— worst case scenario— their lives.

Andrea has seen it before. Argentina is a country strongly affected by floods. About seven years ago, so much rain fell— several months’ worth in just a couple of hours— that it triggered a flash flooding of unexpected magnitude. Hundreds of thousands in La Plata and Buenos Aires lost everything that day. There were widespread power outages. People died.

She didn’t know these things could happen here too. 

As if on cue, her hands find her phone again. Her messages have gone unanswered. That, and the swelling rain outside, is enough to have her fingers scroll for Lena and press the ‘call’ button immediately.

It rings and rings and rings.

Finally, the line clicks, but it’s just Lena’s voicemail. Irritated, Andrea hangs up and tries again. And again. She leaves a short message for Lena, her spiking cortisol levels leaving her words clipped, and she ignores her bracelet’s incessant buzzing against her wrist as she calls Lena’s PA next.

Jessica, too, isn’t at her desk at L-Corp, it seems, and before part of her can dive headfirst into mindless panic over it, the rational parts of her brain come to the rescue and reach a calming conclusion: Lena has heard the warnings. She has sent everyone home. She is probably on her way there herself and will be waiting for Andrea, safe and sound. Or she’s already under the shower— much too hot as per usual— which is why she’s not answering her phone.

Yes, that has to be it.

Lena is smart like that. And she cares about her people too. She is fine.

Andrea blows out a long breath and gets to her feet. The rain is bad, but it’s not _impossible_ just yet. She is going to send the few people inside the building home before packing her things and following her own orders. It’s a blessing it’s only a handful of people that have to be taken care of today— handymen not included. Everyone else is already working remotely until she tells them otherwise.

It takes her thirty minutes, maybe an hour, to get everyone out the door and see them safely to their various means of transportation. White vans, cabs, city busses. She has handed out branded promotional umbrellas from the supply closet like they’re complimentary chocolates and called some of the cabs herself— her assistants are safely at home where they belong— but there isn’t much else she can do. People will have to brace the storm on their own.

They will be fine. Everyone will be fine.

She certainly can’t stop the rain. Or she would. She definitely would.

Andrea hates getting her feet wet. Unfortunately, she hates gumboots even more. They’re an abomination before God.

When she finally arrives home, she’s drenched. Just from the short sprint to the door, and despite her doorman holding it for her. Her clothes are clinging to her like damp cellophane under her coat, her hair is dripping, and she’s uncomfortable and cold, leaving a small puddle where she stands as she tries to keep her hands steady enough to get the key to slide into the lock.

“Lena?” She calls out when she finally manages and opens the door. “ _Che_ , Lena! Are you home? Hello?”

Andrea drops her keys into the bowl, steps out of her shoes and pulls on her comfy socks.

There is no answer.

She leaves her coat to drip from a hanger in the hallway, and pokes her head into the kitchen, the bathroom, the living room. No Lena. She carefully opens the bedroom door next, hoping against hope to find Lena curled up with a book and a cup of tea, but the bedroom is empty too, the bed made and untouched since this morning.

Andrea immediately checks her phone.

No texts, no calls, no nothing.

She feels a surge of panic. Her stomach churns with nerves. Nausea crawls up her throat, biting and erosive. She has to consciously work against her gag reflex, and covers her mouth so she doesn’t vomit in the bedroom. She swallows down the liquid that rises and threatens to spew out.

There is nothing to be afraid of, nothing concrete, nothing worth losing her mind over. It’s just rain, she tells herself. The sky hasn’t fallen. Not yet.

She thumbs her phone, checks the time, yanks the buzzing bracelet off her wrist and throws it into her underwear drawer before slamming it shut. It’s five forty-three in the afternoon. Not that late at all— even when it looks like it’s already the middle of the night outside. It’s the middle of the night on the last day, and Andrea knows she’s exaggerating in her worked-up state, but she still has to forcefully tear her gaze away from the window, the lonely bed, and Lena’s pile of books on the nightstand. She tells herself to get a grip, pulling herself out of the bedroom by her own figurative ear.

Her phone always in view and within reach, she sets up camp in the kitchen, washes her hands, and gets ready to start dinner.

It’s still early. Lena is fine. She will call. She will come home.

Andrea tries to keep her stinging mind under control as her hands are busy chopping veggies into even pieces. She watches the blade go through fibers and flesh, feels the small resistance of skin break as she puts pressure on it. Again, and again, and again.

As her hands move, her heart follows the quick, sharp rhythm of the knife chop, chop, chopping against the cutting board, and she tries to relax into the sound and the repetitive motions.

By the time her biggest pot is filled to the brim and simmering merrily, she still hasn’t heard a single word from Lena. And, with her hands and mind once again idle and fretting, that’s quite enough to set off the panic again— her palms sweaty, her heart drumming a bit faster.

She calls Lena’s number. It goes to voicemail.

She tries Jessica and L-Corp.

She finds herself pacing the rooms like a restless wolf, her phone clutched in her clammy hand and her stupid foot throbbing dully, and makes herself sit.

It only lasts for a few minutes.

She goes through all the rooms again, not quite sure why, or what she’s hoping to find behind closed doors that hasn’t been there the first twenty-two times, but she also can’t not do it.

Her feet circle the rug; carefully avoid stepping on the grout joints in the kitchen and the bathroom.

She holds her breath. Counts to seven. Forgets what she’s supposed to do next.

When she looks down at her phone in her hands again, she’s one brainless second away from dialing Luthor Mansion— assuming the number hasn’t changed in all these years— but thinks better of it at the last moment. Luthor Mansion is the last place on earth Lena would go. She’d rather die than—

Andrea yelps, bites her lip, and hobbles back into the living room, throwing herself onto the couch with a dismayed thud. She is definitely losing it, and all the breathing exercises and mindfulness techniques aren’t _shit_. They are doing absolutely nothing. She tries breathing through the convoluted mess in her chest anyway.

It doesn’t help.

She reaches for the remote and turns on the TV, but mutes it at once. The last thing she needs right now is little people talking in her ear. She flips through the channels without paying attention, drops the remote, and stares off into space.

She needs to pull herself together. Lena is _late_. That is all. She is _fine_. And she, Andrea, is overreacting big time. Even the police would tell her to wait— how many hours is it again? — until they’d let her file an official missing person’s report.

She stares at the TV without blinking. She needs to calm the fuck down.

She wills her hands to settle on her stomach. She wills her muscles to relax. She wills her heart to slow.

But it doesn’t. It’s still racing. She tells herself it’s just from the hectic day she’s had and the residual stress and shock of the earthquake last week. But a small voice in her head whispers that it’s because she’s thinking of shadows, too. Long, unnatural shadows and, perhaps, unnatural rain. Andrea’s chest tightens. Her heart trips and falls, causing a swooping sensation in her stomach. She needs to control her breathing. She hasn’t had a single episode in years, and she’s not going to start now. She is fine. She is in control of her body.

Mindful of the spinning room, she sits up slowly, wipes sweat from her forehead, and puts her hands on her head until she can catch her breath.

If she goes back to the kitchen and checks on dinner, maybe she’ll relax again. If she focuses on dinner and nothing else for a bit— and maybe has a little snack to calm her frazzled nerves— she can get it together.

She swings her legs off the couch, looks down at her hands clutching her knees. Her fingernails are purple; her hands are cold. She shakes her head. She definitely needs to eat something.

“¡ _Calláte_!” she says to the voice in her head. “Chill out.” She fights the bubbling panic. “Lena is fine! Everything is fine!”

Her heart is not slowing down. This hasn’t happened in years. Not at work, not in Pilates (if she finds the time to go, that is), not while she’s out running to clear her head. Her body usually obeys.

She stays on the couch, pulls her legs up and presses the soles of her feet together carefully, so that her legs form a wing shape. She presses on her knees. She tries breathing like they do on the damn tapes that she threw out after fifteen minutes— deep, slow breaths.

Nothing will take this away from her. Nothing will take Lena away from her. Nothing.

She can handle waiting. That’s all this is; all she has to do. Just wait. She tells herself that every part of her can handle that, handle the waiting until Lena walks through that door: her hands, her feet, her mind, and her heart. 

She will wait. She will not panic.

She sits and waits and breathes. The tight knot in her chest comes undone, her pulse slows.

She untangles her limbs and slowly pads into the kitchen. She peeks into the pot, adjusts the heat, and gently stretches her arms over her head and rolls her shoulders. She eats a banana. She has a glass of water. She changes out of her work clothes.

When she returns to her perch on the couch, she’s wearing an oversized sweatshirt and yoga pants, her skin is warm and smells of lavender oil, and her lips taste like honey. She wraps herself tighter in the big woolen blanket that reminds her of home, and lights the candle on the coffee table.

Her phone lies silent and dark beside it, unchanged.

She watches the little flame.

She waits.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, that was a little window into Andrea’s head. ... Thoughts? 😊
> 
> * * *
> 
> Mostly food-related Spanish.🥘🍴 And some bits we already know. Here’s the list:
> 
>  **Andrea <> English** in this chapter:
> 
>   * Locro — a hearty meat and corn-based stew of (northern) Argentina. Not an everyday meal, but a national dish linked with the 25th May celebrations. (25 de Mayo – a national holiday in Argentina to commemorate the week-long revolutionary events that led to the creation of Argentina’s first independent government, and the wresting of control away from Spain on 9th July 1816.) Locro and 25 de Mayo traditionally go together. 
>   * porotos pallares — lima beans
>   * osso buco — stewing beef (shank)
>   * panceta salada — smoked bacon
>   * chorizo de cerdo — spicy sausages
>   * mondongo — tripe
>   * patitas de cerdo — pigs feet
>   * abuela — grandmother
>   * Chimichurri — sauce (for cooking or as table condiment), made of finely chopped parsley, minced garlic, olive oil, oregano, and red wine vinegar.
>   * “¡Calláte!” — “Shut up!”
> 



	11. Water

Kara likes winter. She likes the calm and the quiet. She likes everything slowing down and people staying indoors more, all comfy and safe. Usually, winter gives her a much needed break. Fewer people outside means lower crime rates and— safe for the odd accident or her lending a hand with Christmas decorations downtown— winter means less work for her to complete in a day.

Not this winter, though. This winter is a mean creature, relentless and brutal, the chill sinking its claws deep into pink, uncovered flesh.

Kara, of course, can’t feel it. She can spot the low temperatures in the frozen harbor basin and the thick layer of ice and snow that’s coating the ground like frosting. She can taste the bitter cold on the air that’s rushing past her face as she flies. She can smell the dry heat of modern heating systems, cranked up as high as they will go, and the smouldering wood or coal being burned in stoves. She can even hear the winter weather: trees creaking under the extra weight, screeching wheels spinning on icy roads, desperate for traction; heavy, crunchy footsteps and muffled curses, mumbled into thick scarves or blown out hotly against mittens.

After the heavy rain and the ice came the snow. All TV and radio stations are playing the warnings on a loop. Only those who have no other choice brave the harsh white world outside. Workers, worried mothers and fathers, pet owners.

Kara has already returned two lost dogs, flown home a small group of teenagers who got stranded in the middle of nowhere when the bus service was suspended, and helped a mom with her stroller and an old lady with her groceries. She has cleared paths— using her heat-vision gently enough so it would melt the ice but not the tarmac— for cargo trucks, mail and package delivery vans, ambulances, and police patrol cars.

Doing so, she has bumped into a few familiar faces, one of them being Maggie Sawyer— formerly detective, now captain of NCPD’s Science Police division.

Of course, Maggie’s unit is out here tonight. Just like the DEO. Just like her.

All of them are watching over the city to make sure the streets stay safe for everyone, not just for those whose unique physique or abilities allow them to withstand the hostile weather conditions. Those like Kara— but also very, very different. Those who aren’t willing to coexist peacefully. Those who give aliens everywhere a bad name.

Looking and listening for trouble, Kara pounds the beat from above, her wet super-suit clinging to her like a second skin. It’s a tad uncomfortable, but she doesn’t have time to fly back to the DEO to change into a dry spare. And, really, it’s not like she has to worry about going hypothermic like a human would, so there’s no real reason for her to abandon her post. She can tolerate this minor discomfort. She doesn’t even feel the cold. She will fly all night if she has to.

And for the most part, the rest of her night goes well.

At least until she finds herself in a frosty… debate with an unruly gang of Lumikons.

The angry, destructive frost giants aren’t interested in keeping the humans safe. They don’t care about keeping things civil. All they want to do is hit everything and everyone in their path with blasts of ice; with a cold so solid and so deep, that even Kara can feel it.

The sharp freeze hits her in the chest and sinks into her body like an anchor. Her muscles tremble, her teeth chatter, her skin pulls taut with stinging cold, and she braces against the attack, digging her heels into the ice on the ground so she doesn’t slide.

“Hey! Cut it out!”

Compared to them, her freeze breath is but a pathetic excuse for an ice power. They would probably not even feel it. They would laugh in her face. But she can fight them with fire.

Kara’s eyes are tired. They itch with the heat building behind them. She blinks, then shoots hot rays at the nearest giant’s feet, pushing him and his cronies back.

“Move it!”

The frozen ground cracks and hisses, steam blowing up and cloaking the tension in the air between them in a thin, white veil.

There’s a split second pause, then three mouths spew ice, while a pair of red-hot eyes shoots fire. When they meet in the middle, the clash is deafening. It booms like thunder, the shockwave rocking through Kara and nearly knocking her off-balance.

She grunts and holds steady, redoubles her efforts. Her jaw is clenched tight enough to chip a tooth, her nails dig into her palms, her toes curl inside her boots.

“Go back! This isn’t the place for you!” Kara grinds out between clenched teeth, even when she isn’t sure her words are understood. “Go home!”

Lumikons are a savage but solitary race. They keep to themselves. They don’t live in packs or travel in them, which makes this little party of three an anomaly. They also stay clear of cities. Normally.

Kara wonders why this group has left the mountains and come down wandering into the city. Perhaps it’s the weather. Maybe they got lost.

She strains harder, her fire melting their ice and making it rain. She stops just before hitting them, redirects her heat-vision to the ground at their feet instead. She doesn’t want to harm them— not quite sure she even could— she wants to force them back.

A Lumikon throws its head back and roars, the sound similar to a car crash: ear-splitting screeching, violent smashing of metal, shattering glass.

Kara covers her ears, her intercom digging deeper into them and nearly making her jump when it crackles to life.

“Kara? Kara, can you hear me?”

“I’m a little busy here, Alex,” Kara pants out, playing whack-a-mole with giant, ice-sculpted feet until they shuffle back; until they turn and run, their owners leaving a path of icy destruction in their wake. Great.

“Yeah, I can see that. Backup’s on the way.”

“I don’t need—”

“ETA two minutes.”

“I can handle—”

“Kara!”

“What?!”

Kara rolls her eyes. She can’t see Alex, but she can picture her, either shaking her head or pinching the bridge of her nose, or both. Her words are a little strained when she speaks again.

“J’onn and Nia are on their way,” she says in her no-nonsense tone. “You can stay in pursuit, but don’t engage again until they get there, okay?”

Kara grinds her back teeth. She’s got this. Alex doesn’t have to send in the cavalry.

“And Kara? Did you… miss a deadline, or something?”

“Huh?”

“Your phone’s been going off like crazy inside your locker,” Alex says. “Looks like your boss is trying to get a hold of you?”

“What?”

“Work, Kara. Your job.” Alex sounds a little exasperated now. “Whatever it is, we can get you a good cover, but to do damage control, I need to know what the damage is first.”

Kara’s brain shifts gear as she takes to the skies and stays on the ice giants’ tail. She can’t for the life of her imagine why Miss Rojas would call her this late. Not unless she has messed up royally. Maybe she has accidentally done something wrong when she uploaded her newest articles, and now the ‘cloud’ they’re supposed to save their unreviewed work to while working from home is broken? Maybe she’s caused the servers to crash? Maybe she’s uploaded a virus that she didn’t know was on her laptop? It wouldn’t be the first time she’s unwittingly broken something at work. Or maybe, Miss Rojas has hated her articles so much that she simply couldn’t wait until tomorrow’s meeting to tell Kara as much. If that’s true, however, it’s a new record. Not even Snapper did that to her.

“Kara?”

“I don’t know what… what it is about,” she says, refocusing on Alex’s voice in her ear. “Ignore it. Turn it off. I’ll deal with it tomorrow. I’ll—”

A sound cuts through her unfinished sentence and her concentration then, causing her to stop and hover on the spot in midair. It’s nothing more than a faint whisper carrying on the wind, but it has the hairs at the nape of her neck bristle and her mouth go dry.

“Shh. Wait,” she says unnecessarily, holding up a hand and removing her coms with the other, so her ears can focus better. She listens, filtering out the sounds of the city until they become a quiet backdrop. Nature— once again— fills the empty space left behind in her consciousness, and, closing her eyes, Kara gently wades through the creaking and crunching and breathing, tracking like a dog would a scent until her ears have found what she is looking for: a heartbeat. 

It is far away, but going wild like a broken war drum, and Kara whirls around in an instant.

“Help!”

There it is again, the whisper. Only now it is crystal clear and sharp like a piece of ice. Only now it is Lena.

Kara doesn’t think. She takes off in the direction of Lena’s voice, going faster and faster, despite the darkness and poor visibility. She doesn’t care if she has to go through a building, or a wall of clouds swollen with snow, or an airplane to get to Lena.

She has to get to Lena.

She presses her arms tighter to her body, flexes her legs and points her toes perfectly, and gives it her all, shooting through the night like a streamlined, blue-and-red arrow. An arrow, locked-in and pointing at its target in the distance, long before her eyes can see it.

She flies over snow-covered roads and fields, and little clusters of country-style houses typical of National City’s suburbs, the empty spaces between them growing wider and wider. She flies over trees. She flies over a whole lot of nothing.

In her ears, Lena’s heartbeat is growing louder, which means wherever she is and whatever is happening, Lena is still alive and she, Kara, is getting closer, but Lena is completely silent now, either won’t or can’t call out for help again.

Kara goes lower, the wind rushing past and her cape flapping behind her, a funny swooping sensation in her belly. Her ears block just as she is flying over a massive mansion, standing tall like a dark, black mountain in the middle of an empty white field. She lets herself sink faster, her stomach flipping over with the sensation. She’s going down too fast, but she doesn’t care. She is already preparing to land.

Her feet hit the ground. The ice cracks. Her boots sink into the frozen muck, up to her shins.

“Lena?!” Kara calls out, but she doesn’t get an answer. It’s probably not the smartest move to announce herself standing out here, just moments away from entering Lex Luthor’s secret mansion, but Lex Luthor is dead, and Kara doesn’t give a damn who hears her as long as Lena knows she’s coming to help her. “Lena, where are you?”

Kara takes a few decisive steps forward, the frozen snow no match for her frantic fury. Whoever is trying to hurt Lena will have to answer to Supergirl, and Supergirl is in a mood.

She kicks open the gate, stomps towards the door, but then pauses as the beat of Lena’s heart flickers in her ears. It dulls, comes in and out of focus like a bad transmission, and Kara’s lip curls back over her teeth as she looks up at the concrete monstrosity in front of her, its many beady eyes black, no lights in any of the windows.

Lena isn’t in there, she can’t be, but she is somewhere close-by— and whatever the strange energy is that surrounds this mansion, it’s messing with Kara’s hearing.

Kara pushes off again, thrusts high enough to put some distance between herself and the roof of the place where they— she, and Mon-El, and Alex— fought Reign what now feels like a million years ago. She tries to center herself and re-calibrate her internal compass. It’s pointing her North, in the direction of a shady, dense forest, tall trees climbing up a hill where the open field meets the steep rise.

Kara flies over the trees, keeping low enough for their tips to brush her on occasion, too scared she’ll lose Lena again if she goes any higher.

But where is Lena? And why?

She flies over trees for what feels like an eternity spent on a planet covered in nothing but trees, but it’s probably no more than a few short minutes, and when the forest suddenly opens and reveals a vast frozen lake and two lone figures out on the ice, Kara’s heart almost stops dead in her chest.

“I— I don’t have it!” Lena is saying, her voice shrill and panicked as she steps back, her hands raised in front of her body. Her movements are small, unsure and wobbly on the ice. She’s probably wearing heels. “We... we never found it. I don’t know—”

The other person is moving towards her, slowly and deliberately. They are wearing a bright red coat, and for a breathless second, Kara thinks it might be Lillian Luthor, but the height and body type don’t match, and Lillian Luthor is back behind bars where she belongs, anyway. 

“Oh, we know, dear,” the person says. It’s most definitely a woman. Possibly older, but not that old. And, whoever she is, she’s not Lillian. “We know you don’t have it. We also know you know who does. And we’d like to send them a message.”

Lena stumbles backwards and falls, her knees hitting the ice with a thud. She yelps in pain, and Kara’s heart is a fist of thunder.

Before she can react, however, a gun is fired. Again and again.

Lena screams, but she’s not hit, and nothing makes sense anymore, and Kara can’t move. Not until she hears the ice crack. 

It cracks and breaks, and opens up, and Lena falls through into the cold, dark water with a horrible splash.

She screams. She clutches at the edge of the broken ice. “Help me! You c-can’t leave me here! I—” Her trembling voice dies, her fingers slip, her waterlogged jacket drags her down, and she panics, her heart going crazy inside her chest before she goes under.

Kara rushes in, but her landing on the ice makes everything worse. She’s too forceful, too heavy. The fissures in the ice turn into cracks, turn into holes, turn into more endless seconds that Lena is bobbing under the surface in the freezing cold water.

The woman— she laughs, but when Kara, hovering over the ever-growing hole that has swallowed up Lena whole, turns her head in her direction for a split second, ready to blast her into space, she is gone. She has vanished without another sound.

Kara will worry about that later. Right now she has to save Lena.

She tosses her cape aside, then aligns herself with the hole in the ice, takes a deep breath, and lowers her body down into the water upside down slowly, as if she’s held up by an invisible cord tied around her ankles. She goes as far under as she has to, until she can reach around under Lena’s arms and pull her up. She brings her back to the surface and lifts her out of the water, carefully holding her limp body in her arms as she flies her to shore.

Lena’s clothes are too light for winter. Underneath the jacket made for warmer weather— that’s now floating somewhere along the lake’s bottom, Lena is only wearing a silk blouse and a short skirt— a typical Lena outfit for a workday. Her body is terrifyingly cold to the touch, but she doesn’t shiver and she doesn’t stir. Her eyes are closed and her face is pale, her skin almost translucent, almost blue, some of the veins in her dangling arm visible and standing out horribly against the ghostly white. They are blue too, her veins, and her slightly parted lips are blue as well, and if Kara couldn’t hear her slow pulse, she would assume the worst.

She drops her cape onto the ground, spreads it out and gently lowers Lena onto it, her heart splintering in her chest at the sight of her, so small and so fragile, curled up like a little frail figurine. She is porcelain, she is glass, and Kara listens for her shallow breath, waits for a tiny tremulous heartbeat, then carefully wraps her up, swaddling Lena in the sturdy cape like she used to do Kal-El back on Krypton, leaving only her face exposed.

“Lena?” She whispers, cradling the bundle close as she takes off again, hoping that some of her warmth will seep into the cape and reach her. “You’re okay. You’ll be okay.”

She has to get Lena somewhere safe as soon as possible, warm her up— but gently— and then apologize profusely. For not getting here sooner, for being so slow in the face of danger, for being so little help when Lena needs her the most. And then for everything else too.

She is well-aware that, while Lena is still alive right now, she could very well lose her for good tonight, and the thought terrifies Kara to her toes. She could lose Lena, and the last words spoken between them would be in anger. She cannot let that happen.

Lena’s pulse is weak, her heartbeat irregular, and the nearest shelter would be her brother’s mansion, but Kara can’t bring herself to take Lena there. That place is awful and cold, and all the larger-than-life portraits on the walls are watching your every move. Also, it’s probably full of snares and traps specifically designed to keep Kryptonians from trashing the place a second time. No, Kara can’t risk that either. Lena needs her now, and she can’t take care of her _and_ fight off her crazy brother’s inventions at the same time.

So, she heads for the city, flying at top speed. Going fast is actually a lot smoother than going slow, which is better for Lena’s heart. No excessive, vigorous, or jarring movements. Kara knows that much. Lena’s overworked heart couldn’t handle it.

As she flies, Kara zaps the air ahead of them with her heat-vision at odd intervals, taking them through the artificial warm air-pockets. It’s a silly idea, and it probably doesn’t work like she hopes it does, but she has to do something.

When the skyline of National City rises in front of her like a dark sun, Kara stops for a moment, unsure of what to do. She checks Lena’s face, her breathing, her pulse, and finds no changes.

Lena needs medical attention, but Kara isn’t sure if she should take her to NC General or the hospital that has Lena’s own name on the building. Lena would probably prefer the former— if she had a say in the matter— but Kara doesn’t trust any of the doctors at either hospital to take care of Lena like they should. It’s not that the doctors are bad doctors, or that she suspects the nurses on shift of not caring quite as much as their profession should require them to, but it’s a crazy night and the ERs have got to be swamped.

There is only so much efficient, attentive care to go around. And she can’t risk Lena slipping through the cracks. Not again. So she takes her to the one person she trusts, the only person who will understand. She takes her to Alex.

The reprimand dies on Alex’s lips the minute Kara comes rushing up the stairs to the medbay, Lena securely tucked against her. Their eyes meet, and Kara almost crumples into a miserable heap right then and there, feeling herself glow with incandescent self-loathing and inadequacy under her sister’s gaze.

She watches Alex shift from director, ready to yell at her for going dark in the field, to concerned sister, and then land on professional M.D. as Lena is laid down on a bed and hooked up to all kinds of beeping machinery.

Alex wants her out of the room as she and the DEO’s medical team go to work, but Kara refuses point blank, and Alex knows better than to argue with her about Lena.

So Kara stays. She holds Lena’s cold hand— gently, ever so gently— waiting for warmth and life to return to it, even if it means she never gets to hold it ever again.

She watches and listens, her stomach churning with anxiety and bile, but barely understands half of what Alex is telling the others to do. She isn’t really trying to, perhaps, because her blood is humming in her veins and her pulse is too loud from within, and she doesn’t quite remember how coherent thoughts or full sentences work.

They try and warm Lena up for what feels like hours. Everything happens so fast and so agonizingly slow at the same time.

When the flurry of purposeful activity has finally died down, someone pushes a chair under her, and Kara sinks down on it with a grateful sigh. The helpers receive more instructions and then leave them be. It’s only her and Alex now. And Lena.

“We’re warming her blood,” Alex explains in a soft voice, her fingers lightly tapping a bulky machine whirring next to Lena’s bed, and Kara follows her line of vision to the tubes sticking out of Lena’s arm. Blood is pumping in and out of her, slowly, rhythmically, in a twisted imitation of the tides that upsets Kara’s cockleshell of a stomach, flipping it over so violently that Kara inhales sharply and stares at her muddy boots for a minute.

“We’re warming her blood,” Alex says again. “The hemodialysis machine is helping with that. We’ve also done warm fluids: warmed IV fluids, bladder lavage, peritoneal lavage—” Alex points out more tubes, and bags, and all sorts of things connected to Lena's body, but cuts herself off when Kara looks at her.

When she had first arrived on Earth, and had been deadly afraid of doctors— dentists in particular had given her nightmares— Eliza and Jeremiah had explained all the procedures and tools to her until they had become fascinating rather than frightening.

When Alex had studied for her medical degree, Kara had poured over her thick textbooks right along with her during breaks, because that sick fascination with the slightly barbaric methods humans use to treat injuries and illnesses had never quite gone away.

Detailed explanations have always helped her understand better and be less afraid. But Kara has always been a little too curious for her own good too.

And right now, she wishes she had never seen the textbooks or heard the many strange names derived from Latin. She wishes the machines weren’t making such a horrible racket. She wishes there was less blood. She wishes she could erase the image of Lena, small and vulnerable, and still so very pale against the crisp white sheets, from her memory forever. 

“The oxygen mask helps her breathe and gets warm, humidified air into her lungs. And this one monitors her heart rhythm—” Alex points to a screen as she moves towards her, and Kara listens to the reassuring, regular beeping sound for a moment. She doesn’t need it, of course, she could listen to Lena’s heart anytime, but she wouldn’t know what anomalies or problems to look out for, so it’s a good thing Alex can hear Lena’s heart now too. “We’re watching her closely, not just her heart, and we’ve brought her up very carefully, only 1 to 1.5 degrees Celsius per hour.”

Kara nods, but her vision has gone blurry, and when Alex steps behind her and puts her hands on her shoulders, her head drops and the tears start to fall.

She won’t let go of Lena’s hand, so she just lets them drip, drip, drip onto her thighs. She presses her lips together hard to keep from sobbing, because she isn’t sure if Lena can hear them, and she doesn’t want to disturb her resting. It’s important that Lena rests. She can’t have Kara crying over her like she’s dead— even if she came very, very close— because this isn’t a funeral, and Kara has no right to cry. She wouldn’t, even if it were.

Alex’s arms wrap around her, holding her tight and anchoring her like a moored buoy in a storm.

“She’s going to be okay,” she says, and Kara swallows down the sob that is rising in her throat with difficulty. “We make sure she is okay.”

Kara’s heart hiccups in her chest.

“Okay.”

They stay like that for a little while, then Alex excuses herself from the room to deal with another DEO matter. She goes, but not before reassuring Kara that, should anything happen, she will be back within seconds. She also has an agent bring her a burger, fries, and a double chocolate milkshake, but Kara doesn’t touch any of it. Her throat closes up even thinking about it.

She sits and waits and watches.

She won’t move a muscle until Lena opens her eyes.

When Lena finally does, Kara actually stops breathing. She’s a perfect statue carved in stone, a watcher, a protector. And she’ll never leave Lena’s side again. Even if that means being her unwelcome shadow for the rest of her life.

Lena stirs. Her eyelids flutter. Watery green flinches away from the brightness of the room before her pupils find the right balance, and Lena’s tired gaze finds Kara’s face. She just looks at her, a pained, defeated expression on her face.

Kara swallows hard; swallows lumps the size of boulders and sobs that would shake the earth. “You…” she begins, then falters.

Underneath the pain in Lena’s eyes, there’s something else, something almost like wistfulness, and it goes through Kara like a Kryptonite dagger, the blade piercing her heart and cutting damaged muscle tissue clean in two.

The urge to throw herself onto the floor and beg for Lena’s forgiveness on her knees is overwhelming. Kara stays in her seat anyway.

“I— I almost didn’t… _you_ almost didn’t—! Lena, I’m—”

Lena closes her eyes, shakes her head. It’s only the tiniest movement, barely a soft rustling sound against the pillow, but Kara falls silent at once— even when the dagger in her chest twists and sinks in deeper; sinks in right to the hilt.

When Lena looks at her again, her face is a hard mask, but Kara can still see the pain behind it. The old Kara— the Kara who was just Kara, the Kara who never lied to Lena— would have gotten up from her chair now and carefully gathered her friend up into a long hug. She would have lied down right next to her on the bed, and stroked Lena’s hair and arm, letting her fingers draw soothing, intricate patterns. The old Kara would have held Lena’s hand in hers and just been happy that Lena was alive and awake.

And Kara _is_ holding Lena’s hand; and she _is_ happy that her eyes are open, but her relief and happiness feel like something that’s been moved an inch or two to the left in her absence. Holding Lena’s hand feels _right_ , but it also feels very, very wrong. 

“Oh, good. You’re awake.” Alex comes bustling back into the room, her trained eye lingering on Lena’s face for a moment and then studying the many monitors, before she checks all the tubes and wires.

Kara admires Alex’s professional tone and her neutral expression. She’s not Alex Danvers right now, she’s Alex Danvers, doctor of medicine, and blissfully unaffected by the way Lena’s eyes narrow to shoot tiny arrows into her turned back and through the back of her head.

“Quite a nasty case of stage three hypothermia you had everybody worried about. How are you feeling? Any numbness in your fingers or toes? You’re probably going to feel sore for a while, I’m afraid. Exposure, extremely low temperatures, and—”

Lena’s trembling hand finds her face, finds the oxygen mask, and pulls it down clumsily. “No! _Home_ ,” she rasps. “I want—”

“Your temperature was way below 89.9 degrees when you came in. Your vital functions aren’t stable.”

“C-can’t keep,” Lena tries again, but her voice is too weak to manage a whole sentence, and she coughs. What she lacks in words, however, she makes up for in her best death stare. It’s not as deadly as Kara knows she is capable of making it, but it gets the point across. 

“That’s right,” Alex says calmly, as though they’re having a regular conversation about something normal, like the weather. “We can’t keep you here against your will and we won’t try to if you wish to leave—”

Now Kara finds herself glaring up at her sister too, a little more hotly than she deserves after saving Lena’s life, perhaps, but she can’t help it.

“—but if you leave, you’re doing so against medical advice and I will have you sign a form stating as much, because I’m not interested in losing my license if your ticker gives out in the parking lot. You and I both know that leaving before you’re stable is… unwise at best. So, please, if you go, go straight to a hospital or, I don’t know, hire someone with the knowledge and equipment you’ll need for the next 24 to 48 hours.” Alex takes a breath, then continues before either of them can get a word in. “Oh, and you should probably let the hemodialysis machine finish first. Before you decide to do anything… else.”

She gives a half-shrug, as if she’s not worried at all and none of this is bothering her in the slightest, but Kara knows better. She has seen how hard Alex has worked on Lena in the past hours. She knows Alex cares. But maybe pretending she doesn’t will actually get Lena to do the right thing. Telling her what to do certainly won’t.

Lena closes her mouth, swallows painfully, then deflates a little as she turns her head to look at the machine that’s still whirring merrily at her bedside. Her mouth is set in a thin, serious line as her eyes follow the tubes to her arm, then she freezes.

It takes Kara a moment to understand why.

Lena’s hand twitches in hers, like a butterfly caught in a closed fist. Kara doesn’t want to let go, but she will if that’s what Lena wants. If you touch a butterfly too much, it won’t fly— and the last thing she wants to do is hurt Lena even more.

Their eyes meet. Lena’s are wide like an open door— before she slams it shut and pulls away enough for Kara to get the hint.

Kara lets go, bites her lip, fidgets with her hands in her lap. She doesn't know where to look. She can’t not look at Lena.

Lena seems to be sinking deeper into her pillow. Her breath rattles as she inhales. She doesn’t look back at Kara, but keeps her eyes on Alex. 

“Fine. I will… wait. Get… that form, _Director_ ,” Lena forces the words out, each one shivering in the great silence in the room like something naked, blind and helpless, abandoned after a painful birth.

Alex doesn’t answer. She doesn’t like this, Kara can read it on her face, but there isn’t anything they can do about it. They can’t make Lena stay.

“I’ll get you a report for whoever takes it from here,” Alex finally says, still shaking her head slightly. “And Lena?”

Lena tenses at the mention of her name like she wants to take it back, take it out of their mouths and pretend they’ve never felt it forming on their tongues, but Kara will always remember what saying her name out loud feels like.

“On the matter of your transportation. You—”

“I’ll… need to call…” The rest of Lena’s words are drowned out by a coughing fit, and Alex's attention shifts to the heart rate monitor.

“It’s impossible out there, roads are closed. So, you can leave the DEO on one condition,” she tells Lena, in that deep, stern voice reserved for her agents— or Kara, when she’s mad. The voice that means she’ll brook no dissent. “Wherever you want to go, Kara will take you.”

“But…”

“Look, you can recklessly endanger your own life all you want, but I will not send any of my agents with you to do the same just because you’re too stubborn for your own good.” Alex fixes her with a look that brings a hint of color to Lena’s cheeks, and, although it’s not directed at her, Kara can feel heat burning in her own face too. “And, if you’re even half the boss I know you are, you won’t ask your people to do it either. Even the best driver… it’s just not safe.”

“Okay,” Lena says after a long pause.

“Okay? Okay, you’ll go with Kara?”

“Yes.”

The word pulses through Kara like her own heartbeat. She knows, Lena has only agreed because she would rather freeze for real a second time before putting someone else’s life in danger. Still. She could have said no. She could have decided to stay at the DEO. She hasn’t. She has chosen her.

Kara tries to act normal, not to show the rush of warmth that’s spreading through her body, but she is so very aware of her loud heart, of how it pumps blood and adrenaline and hope.

Yes.

It’s not much and maybe it’s nothing, but it could also be something. It could be a start.

Kara catches Alex’s eye, her sister’s expression warning her subtly to keep it together and to not read anything into this. Well, Alex’s warning has come much too late. Kara’s foolish heart has already read the entirety of all words ever recorded in the English language into it.

Lena could ask her to fly her to another galaxy tonight, and she would do it.

Alex sighs. “Alright. I’ll go handle the paperwork. But you better get more color into those cheeks if you expect me to discharge you.”

Lena blinks. “Not a hospital,” she mumbles.

“No, but a real doctor.” A grin plays at the corner of Alex’s mouth, then she turns her attention back to Kara. “Come on. Let her rest for a couple minutes.”

Alex opens the door and holds out her hand, as if expecting Kara to take it and follow her out of the room. Just like Eliza asked her to when Kara was a confused, overstimulated alien that couldn’t be trusted to cross the street by herself.

Kara doesn’t move. She doesn’t want to leave Lena. It takes two raised eyebrows and a pointed look from her big sister to convince her otherwise.

“That was close,” Alex says when Kara follows her to her office. “Very close. Kara, what the hell happened? You can’t just… take off like that. You need to at least let me know—”

“Lena was in danger.”

“I know that now, but Kara—”

“There was no time. I almost didn’t make it.” She doesn’t say that, had she been more focused or a little faster, things might have gone very differently. If she hadn’t frozen, if she had acted more quickly, she could have prevented Lena from getting hurt at all. She could have captured the person responsible. She still will.

Alex shakes her head. “We can talk about this later. Now, about Lena—”

Kara listens intently as Alex explains about the effects of prolonged exposure to very cold temperatures or sudden immersion in cold water on the human body. She explains what happens when a person’s body temperature drops, how the heart, the nervous system and other organs can’t work normally anymore. She talks about complete failure of the heart and the respiratory system, and about death too, even when Kara doesn’t want to hear it. Alex tells her what to listen for when she listens to Lena’s heart on the way, how to spot cardiac arrhythmia, and what it means if the heart is going too fast or too slow. She tells her what she should do in case of emergency.

They let Lena rest for a bit. Kara grudgingly trudges into the DEO's kitchen and reheats a couple slices of leftover pizza in the communal microwave, raiding the fridge for more treats while she waits for the machine to ping. She changes into a clean suit and brushes her hair.

When she returns to the med bay and timidly knocks on the door, Alex’s voice tells her to wait another couple minutes, so she stands outside in the hall, rubbing her leg with her boot and trying not to look as nervous as she feels. She plays with her hair, she picks at her cuticles, she waits.

When she is finally called inside, Lena is sitting on the bed wearing DEO sweats and a sparkly silver blanket around her shoulders that’s definitely not from this planet. She’s wired, connected to a little portable monitor that’s clipped to her pants like an old-fashioned Walkman. Kara’s eyes follow the different-colored wires to where they vanish into the hoodie, then travel all the way up to Lena’s face.

Their eyes meet, the device beeps a warning, and Kara nearly jumps out of her skin and super-suit.

Lena gives her a small, fleeting smile then. It’s barely even there, and gone again in the blink of an eye, but Kara can’t help but smile back as it flashes through her like too much sugar, leaving her giddy and slightly off-balance.

“Um, so…” She shuffles her feet, looks down at the tips of her boots. “How do you, um… I mean, where are we, uh…” Her hand flies up to adjust the glasses she isn’t wearing. She pushes a strand of hair behind her ear instead. “Space taxi ready for boarding. No, wait, that came out wrong.”

Kara makes herself shut up before she can make it worse. She licks her lips, and glances up once her heart has stopped screeching in mindless panic.

Lena’s portable monitor beeps again.

Somewhere to her left, Alex hastily turns an involuntary chuckle into a cough and clears her throat. She looks back and forth between them, not a single muscle in her face betraying her thoughts. “Kara— gently, slowly, carefully. Any sign of trouble, you turn right back around. Got it?”

Kara nods, and Lena opens her mouth, but Alex talks over her. “Lena— bedrest, watch that heart, your blood sugar and electrolytes. Keep warm, but nothing crazy like hot baths. Have someone there with you at all times in case of emergency. Someone who knows what they are doing, preferably. Someone with medical training. Someone who isn’t you. You can’t monitor yourself. No matter how smart you are.”

The muscle in Lena’s cheek twitches, but she doesn’t argue. She’s still very pale, which makes the fresh pink in her cheeks stand out even more.

Alex waits for either of them to speak. They don’t.

Lena pulls the blanket a little tighter around her body. She looks at Kara.

“I’ll leave you to it.” Alex ducks out of the room, leaving them to sort out their bodies and limbs until they fit, and Lena is securely resting in Kara’s arms, with Kara supporting her weight under her legs and behind her back.

Lena wants to keep her head up as they walk down the stairs and cross the floor to the balcony, but Kara can tell she’s exhausted. The little action of being scooped up off the bed and adjusted to be carried comfortably has already left her winded and gasping for air quietly, and after a moment of internal and external struggle, Lena finally gives up and gives in, tension leaving her body as she’s wrapping her arms around Kara’s neck and resting her head against her chest.

They sigh in unison.

“Ready?” Kara asks as she steps out onto the balcony, tucking Lena a little closer and tightening her grip. It’s still freezing cold, sleet drizzling down from above, but the sky is black and blue rather than grey and pink now, and Kara takes it as a good sign. Enough with the snow already. At least for a little while.

“Uh-huh,” comes the muffled reply. Lena is all wrapped up in her blanket, burrowed deep like a drowsy little animal. The cold and the sleet can’t touch her. Even her face should stay nice and warm if she keeps it pressed against Kara’s neck.

Kara bends her knees and pushes off, slowly ascending to ‘cruising altitude’ and keeping steady, even when the angry wind is pulling at her from all directions.

On the short flight across the city, Kara is very aware. Aware of the fine hairs on her arms and legs standing on end, aware of the wind and Lena’s breathing brushing against her skin, aware of every inch of fabric that covers her body, and the weight of Lena shifting in her arms as she flies a smooth turn. The gentle scent that is so very Lena fills her nose. All she can hear is Lena’s heart thud-thud-thudding, the sound regular but so much quieter than her own heart battering away as Lena’s hand slips and her cool fingertips brush the nape of Kara’s neck.

They’re not flying to Lena’s suite at 1961 Schaffenberger Way, but to another apartment, in another building on the richer side of town. Lena has written down the address on Alex’s paperwork and Alex has shown Kara where to go on her phone. Kara could have told her where they are going even without it.

Lena wants Miss Rojas. She wants to be with her girlfriend. The word sounds funny, even when she’s only thinking it inside her head. But Kara isn’t blind and she isn’t stupid, and that’s what Lena and Andrea Rojas are. Girlfriends. And not in the ‘friend who is a girl’ sense of the word.

Kara remembers the shock when she had first realized that; and the pain throbbing dully right underneath it, like an old scar that still feels sore to the touch sometimes.

It’s not that she isn’t happy for Lena, because she is. Lena deserves someone who makes her happy. She just… misses her. She misses her best friend. She misses their hugs and lunch dates and sleepovers. She misses feeling Lena’s weight on her lap during game nights. She misses her laugh, and the dark shade of red her lips turn after her second or third glass of wine.

The memories squeeze in like a vice, but Lena is no longer in her life, not really, and it’s her own fault. She should have told her sooner. She knew it was her Achilles heel, she knew Lena would hate her for keeping her truth from her— Lillian Luthor had even told her as much years ago, and Kara hates that she was right about it. Lena hates her. Maybe not all of her does, but definitely those parts that matter.

If only Kara had been less selfish, less of a coward, less indecisive when there came the opportunities to come clean. Those happened, she knows it, and she should have seized one before it was too late. If she could go back, she would. But she can’t go back, they can only move forward. Each of them on their own.

Kara’s chest aches with the desire to be back in that time and space, to do it all over again and do it differently, and she wishes the distance between the DEO and Andrea Rojas’ place of residence were greater. She wishes she had more time. She wishes she and Lena could talk when Lena’s all better.

It’s not going to happen. She’ll have to find a way to live with that. That and everything else too.

They’re almost there now, and Kara’s ears perk up, trying to pick up on the yet unfamiliar rhythm of Miss Rojas’ heartbeat. Last time she heard it, has truly listened to it, it had been fast and frantic because of the earthquake. Miss Rojas was truly scared then and also very lucky, because if it hadn’t been for Kara, that steel cabinet would have broken her legs and the desk would have buried her alive.

Andrea Rojas isn’t her favorite person, but she’s not all bad, and she wouldn’t have deserved that. Lena would have been devastated.

Something occurs to Kara then, hot and urgent like a spilled drink, but when she tunes in harder to check, she’s surprised to find a calm and slow-pounding heart. Maybe she is wrong? But it doesn’t make much sense.

She holds Lena a little aloft as they touch down on the balcony to soften their landing and carries her bridal style towards the door, but before she has even reached it, or Lena can start her protests about being strong enough to walk the rest of the way by herself, there’s movement within the apartment. In the unlit adjacent room, a dark figure explodes out of its stupor and comes slamming through the door almost faster than Kara can blink.

It’s Andrea Rojas.

Just like Lena, she is deathly pale, maybe even panicked, like she’s about to make a run for it. But why? From what? Whatever it is, she is definitely scared, and it vibrates through her whole body as she stands there, wrapped in a robe and with bare feet and tousled hair.

She blinks rapidly. Exhales. Her heart takes it down to a seven out of ten.

Nobody says a word.

Miss Rojas is visibly shaken and a little confused, her mouth paused in a small pale-pink O. Her eyes are wet, though tears have yet to spill, and Kara realizes she’s never seen her new boss without her make-up on before. That’s why the pale shade of her lips and her red-rimmed, naked eyes feel off. They’re supposed to be bold red and framed by black eyeliner and pretty eyeshadow, her eyelashes a mile long and dark with tons of mascara. 

Kara frowns, then carefully lowers Lena down and puts her onto her feet, keeping a hand on her back just in case. She can feel Lena tremble, even through the space-blanket, and her heart is pounding, though not hard enough to set off her heart rate monitor. 

“Lena! Oh, _mi alma_!” Miss Rojas stumbles forward and pulls Lena into her arms, holding her tight. “Are you alright? Are you hurt? ¡¿ _En qué bardo te metiste_?! Oh, Lena!” 

Lena doesn’t answer, just lets herself sink into the embrace, and Kara takes a step back. Then another. Just when she’s made up her mind to go and leave them be; to just fly off into the imminent morning silently, Miss Rojas’ voice calls her back.

“Supergirl? Wait a minute?”

Kara turns around, but keeps a safe distance from both her and Lena.

Miss Rojas, too, seems tense as Kara watches her check Lena’s face and kiss her forehead, then gently pat down her shoulders and arms— almost like a worried parent might— before ushering her inside, all the while cooing softly, and with one arm slung around Lena’s middle.

Kara hears them whisper inside, but doesn’t listen in, still half determined to up, up and leave. Instead, she leans back against the concrete balustrade, blows out her cheeks, and looks up at the fading night sky. The sleet isn’t cold, but it’s definitely wet on her cheeks.

She blinks up at the pale stars for a while; right until she can’t see them anymore.

It’s been more than ‘a minute’, the new day is slowly but surely inching towards the horizon by now, and Kara has every right to leave, but she doesn’t. She just hoists herself up to sit on the balustrade, dangling her feet. Now that Lena is safe, and yesterday is finally coming to a close and bleeding right into tomorrow, she feels her exhaustion cover her like a blanket. She is tired, she is hungry, and she can just sit here for a little bit longer.

“You’re… you’re still here.” It’s more of a statement than a question, but Miss Rojas still sounds surprised as she joins her on the balcony, her wild hair now pulled back into a messy ponytail, and with slippers on her feet. In the soft morning light, she looks as tired as Kara feels. “Thank you.”

Kara looks up at her again, not sure what she is being thanked for exactly, but it doesn’t really matter. She hears the words so often, she lets them wash over her without them leaving a trace in her mind. It is fine. It’s what she’s here to do. It’s what heroes are supposed to be doing. She would do it again. She _will_ do it again. Over and over.

“You… you can’t catch a cold, can you?”

“Huh?” Kara blinks confusedly, tries to focus on the other woman better. Andrea Rojas’ plump bottom lip is pinned down by her front teeth, her face is flushed with concern, and Kara’s heart thumps with awareness of her singular focus on her as she feels a blush creep up her chest.

“No. No, I can’t. I’m… fine, thank you.” Miss Rojas smiles at her. “How… How’s Lena?”

“Asleep, I hope. Finally,” Miss Rojas says, trying to shake out the tiny trembles in her hands, but failing. She clasps her left wrist with her other hand instead. “She’s… pretty shaken up. I don’t quite—”

She looks broken, devastated, all of a sudden, and Kara’s breathing goes shallow as her own guilt and anger hit her in waves. They rock against her in a cascade of unexpected sobs, and she covers her face, rubbing at it roughly and dragging her hands down over it, before fanning her eyes. She rolls them skyward, in a final effort to fight off tears, but then gives up and hangs her head.

Exhaustion and embarrassment burn in her cheeks, but there’s nothing she can do about anything. Her eyes are leaking, the tears are running, her breathing won’t calm back down, and she just—

Warm hands touch her thighs, and Kara’s head snaps up with a startled intake of breath. In front of her, Miss Rojas has crouched down low enough to catch her gaze.

“Hey now, no tears. We pull ourselves together.” The edge in her voice isn’t quite covered and it’s still cutting, but there’s kindness in her eyes. Kindness and understanding and compassion. Way too much of it.

Kara sniffles.

“Long night, hmm?” Miss Rojas reaches out to wipe a tear from Kara’s chin with her thumb, and Kara can feel her warm breath— strawberry and cinnamon, Lena’s favorite toothpaste— hit her wet cheek. She nods slowly.

Miss Rojas' gaze turns impossibly softer. “Long day too,” she says, almost as if to herself, her eyes not leaving Kara’s. Kara has always thought her eyes to be blue— just blue, and the steely kind— but they’re actually more green than they are blue right now, and so very soft that Kara wants to look away, but can’t. “You know, even if you can’t catch your death out here.” Miss Rojas pauses to glance up at the sky. “Why don’t you come inside for a… tea? Coffee? Hot chocolate?”

Kara blinks.

“I might even have little marshmallows and pumpkin spice somewhere. You… you like pumpkin spice lattes, don’t you, Kara?”

They both freeze.

Kara feels her jaw drop, her mouth wide enough to catch butterflies in it. She is so stunned, she even forgets to be upset for a moment. She tilts her head and studies the other woman, who has backed up a little, but whose fingertips are still brushing her knees.

“Yeah,” she says finally, her voice a little hoarse. “Yeah, I do.” 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, the super-cat is out of the super-bag. 🦸🏼 ... Thoughts? ❤️
> 
> * * *
> 
> Kara POV, so only a touch of Spanish:
> 
>  **Andrea <> English** in this chapter:
> 
>   * Mi alma — My soul 
>   * “¡¿En qué bardo te metiste?!” — “What messed up situation did you get yourself into?!”
> 



	12. Revelations

Kara follows her inside. She wipes her feet on the mat, hesitates, then bends down to take off her boots, fumbling with the zippers for a moment and hopping in place on one leg when the second boot doesn’t come quietly.

It’s strangely endearing— the super-powered hero taking off her boots so she doesn’t track mud all over her floors, and padding over to where she is waiting for her on mismatched, striped socks, with her hands clasped in front of her body and her head bent just a little.

Kara is shy; the contrast between her body language and her outfit enough to tickle something inside Andrea until she feels the corners of her mouth lift up into a smile.

“Kitchen’s through here,” she says, leading the way and listening to Kara’s soft footfalls behind her. “Just… make yourself at home. I’ll be right back.”

She puts on the kettle and waits until Kara has awkwardly settled at the kitchen table, then goes to fetch her a clean towel from the bathroom. She checks on Lena on her way back, relieved to find her fast asleep.

Andrea adjusts the old phone on the nightstand, plugs in the charger just to be safe, and tiptoes back out into the hallway, leaving the door slightly ajar.

Her phone’s battery is at 97%, which is at least 80 percent higher than what she feels herself running on at the moment, but she has pulled all-nighters on nothing but fumes before. She will be fine. She checks the baby monitor app one more time, then slips her phone back into her pocket, and puts a smile on her face as she re-enters the kitchen.

“Sorry about that. I went to check on Lena real quick. And I got you a towel.” She holds it out to Kara, who takes it, but her blue eyes flicker with confusion. “For your face? And your hair.”

“Oh. Um, thank you.”

Kara hesitates, then rubs her face dry and clumsily wraps the towel around her head.

It’s a little silly perhaps, but even if she can’t get sick from flying around with wet hair in freezing temperatures, that doesn’t mean Andrea has to let her sit here looking like a drowned puppy. The situation is strange enough as it is, and they should at least allow themselves to be as comfortable as they can be.

Andrea gets two mugs from the cabinet, and adds a tea bag to hers. “You’re welcome. So, what can I get you? I wasn’t kidding about the hot chocolate. Or those marshmallows.”

“I… I’d like that. The chocolate and the marshmallows, I mean. If it’s not too much trouble. Anything is fine, really. Or… you know, you don’t have to—”

Andrea holds up a hand to stop the rambling. “I offered.”

“I just…” Kara swallows and looks down, and then looks up again. “Thank you, Miss Rojas.”

“Andrea, please. I’m not calling you ‘Supergirl’, am I?” She smiles and looks at Kara. Her cheeks are the color of her cape. She doesn’t look up from her lap again. “Seems a little… formal, given the circumstances, don’t you think?”

There’s a pause, pregnant like the gestation period of a cow elephant.

“Mm-hmm. Suppose so.”

Something about Kara wearing that suit and cape together with that look on her face just doesn’t compute. Andrea still half expects the picture-perfect smile, the hand-on-hips stance, the confidence that’s supposed to be oozing out of every super-powered pore. But sitting in front of her is just a young woman— a little awkward, a little shy, and so very very human that Andrea wonders how she can be anything but.

“How did you…? You know…” Kara looks up at her, finally, eyes brimming a bit, waiting for her to land that deathly blow, to tell her what she thinks she already knows.

She couldn’t be more wrong. And, even if Andrea can’t do much— not right now, not like this— she can give that to her.

“Lena didn’t tell me,” she says, leaving no room for speculation or doubt. “If that’s what you’re asking me? She just confirmed it. I have eyes, Kara.”

“Oh, okay.” Kara’s brow furrows and deep wrinkles crease her forehead. Andrea swears she can hear the cogs turn. She rushes in before there’s smoke.

“I also know when to keep my mouth shut. Don’t worry.”

Kara’s wide shoulders seem to jump with what Andrea can only assume is surprised humiliation. Kara genuinely seems to have no idea how easy she is to read. If Lena is an open book— with some of its pages sticking together, every other chapter or so— Kara Danvers is a billboard with the lights flashing.

“I just thought…”

“Yeah, I like a good story,” Andrea says, turning around to put a pot on the stove and Kara out of her misery for a moment. She grabs the milk from the fridge. “That doesn’t mean I’d like for you to become the next one. What good would that do? Sure, we’d get more clicks than our servers could handle, but I’m a sensible woman and the cost _greatly_ outweighs the benefit in that scenario, so it’s a hard no. Now and in the future. Just so we’re clear. Your secret is safe with me.”

Andrea stirs in the sugar and vanilla and lowers the heat to keep the milk from boiling, then pours it into the mug. She crouches down and opens the candy drawer, fishing out the bag of tiny marshmallows and an _Águila_ chocolate bar, quickly adding the dark chocolate and a long, ornate spoon to the hot milk, before sprinkling a handful of marshmallows on top.

Carrying both drinks over to the table, she lets herself sink down on the chair opposite Kara and carefully slides the sweet treat over to her, hoping to lure her out and catch her gaze. She can only guess, but if she had to take an educated one, she’d suspect it’s all rather a lot. That’s what it feels like on her end of things anyway. “Careful. It’s very hot.”

“Thank you.”

Andrea is a little surprised at how quiet, how grateful Kara’s voice is when it finally emerges. She watches her stir her drink, then single out a marshmallow and pursue it with her spoon until she lifts it from the chocolatey milk and slides it into her mouth. Her face lights up with a bright, delighted, private smile.

Hot chocolate _never_ fails.

“ _El Submarino_ ,” Andrea says. “You stir it until the chocolate’s completely dissolved. If you do it right, you get hot chocolate _and_ a nice treat of melted chocolate sludge waiting for you at the bottom. Doesn’t call for marshmallows, but Lena likes them.”

At the mention of Lena’s name, Kara’s eyes find hers, and for a heart-clenching second, Andrea worries that it might be too much too soon. She doesn’t want Kara to cry again, but she also needs to talk to her about tonight, about Lena, or she is going to combust.

“Thank you for saving Lena’s life, Kara,” she begins, wondering instantly if she should have chosen a gentler approach, but also realizing she’s too exhausted to pussyfoot around the truth. “She said she fell through the ice and you got her out?”

Kara nods, but her eyes are wet, glistening dangerously. “I almost didn’t. I was almost too late,” she says, quickly staring down at her drink as she stirs it slowly.

Kara’s admission runs through Andrea like burning gasoline. She feels her heart beat faster and has to grab her mind by the scruff of its neck and yank it away from the ‘what if’ scenario that would send her into hysterics, if she let it play out in her head.

“But you did. You saved her. You brought her home.” She hesitates. “Kara, can you tell me… I’m sorry, I’m still trying to piece it all together. Do you know why, why Lena was… wherever she was?”

Kara shakes her head. “I don’t know why she was out on the lake. One of her brother’s secret hideouts is in the area, though.”

Andrea doesn’t like the sound of that. Nothing good ever comes from something that has Lex Luthor’s name attached to it. She makes a mental note to ask Lena about it, already expecting a whole lot of evasive non-answers.

“There was someone out there with her. A woman,” Kara says into her thoughts, and Andrea tenses up. She doesn’t like the sound of that either.

“A woman?”

“Yeah, she… she was threatening Lena. And she had a gun.” Kara’s eyes flash with anger. Her hands uncurl from around her mug and ball into fists, then relax again. “I didn’t see her face before she vanished, but she was wearing a bright red coat. I’m sure she was one of Lex’s—”

“A red coat? And she… she vanished?”

“Yeah.”

Andrea doesn’t say what she’s thinking. She doesn’t tell Kara about the red-hot thing that just plummeted right through into her stomach and has set her insides on fire. Instead, when her mouth opens, all she can manage is: “That’s… odd.”

She doesn’t even sound like herself; she’s all trembles— hands, mouth, voice, but thankfully, Kara can’t tell. She’s too busy glowering down at her drink.

“I’m going to get her. For what she did to Lena,” Kara grinds out, all tension and teeth, and Andrea can catch glimpses of something her mind doesn’t quite know how to sort, label and categorize just yet. There is more to Kara Danvers than meets the eye. Looking at her is like looking down into a beautiful body of water without grasping its depth. You can see the ripples at the surface and make out everything the light touches. But beyond that? — It’s nothing but murky, almost opaque layers. Andrea won’t place a bet on how deep the waters actually are. She can only hold her breath for so long.

“I’m sure you will. Lena is lucky you were there, lucky to have you in her life,” she says, a little breathless, curbing her words and thoughts and bringing them back into line.

She means it. Of course she does. Maybe it’s always been supposed to be this way; perhaps it’s fate, perhaps it’s just serendipity, but she’s almost violently awash with gratitude— gratitude, of all possible things she could be feeling right now— that Lena had Kara tonight; that she still has her when it counts. Whatever happens next, Lena has Kara. The thought is a little jagged and it is sharp like salt in a cut, but the burn is also reassuring. If everything crumbles and falls, Lena will be safe. And that’s all that matters.

“I can’t thank you enough, Kara.” Andrea leans forward, reaching for Kara’s hand and covering it with her own. She’s warm-blooded, rarely ever cold, but Kara’s skin is even warmer and amazingly soft, like running her thumb over smooth, warm velvet.

“I… I don’t think…” Kara blushes deeply and makes about a hundred different little gestures: a shrug, a little hand wave with her free hand, a shake of the head. It’s infuriatingly adorable.

“She talks about you, you know. I know it’s not my place, but I really think you two should talk. When she’s… herself again. She misses you.”

Kara blinks rapidly, then shakes her head so vehemently, the towel slips and sinks down over her eyes. “It’s all a mess,” she says, wrangling with both her hair and the towel until she gives up and simply lets it drop down into her lap. “We’re a mess. I don’t think Lena wants…”

Andrea can hear the pain in her voice, see the cracks beneath the brave face she’s put on. Kara looks away, turns her head, a bit of the blush still warming her cheeks. She bites her lip.

“I don’t want to… make things worse?” Kara glances at her, unsure, her bottom lip still trapped underneath her relentless teeth as she worries it. If she were Lena, Andrea would tell her to stop it and take her face between her hands to kiss the sting away. 

“We both know she won’t come to you, Kara. You have to talk to her.”

Kara licks her assaulted lip, the tip of her tongue peeking out. “So, you… you think she’ll… want to talk to me?”

The honest answer is no. Lena is nothing if not stubborn. Exasperatingly so. But if it weren’t for Kara, she would have lost Lena tonight. One way or another, she still will; it’s only a matter of time now, but that isn’t Kara’s fault— not really, not truly— and, even if it’s the last thing she does, Andrea will make sure Kara and Lena talk. It’s the least she can do. Even if Lena will hate her for it. Even if it means she’ll lose her even faster. Even if she will break her own foolish heart doing it.

“She should. She will. You saved her life,” she says, feeling her chest heave with a deep sigh as she leans back in her chair.

“I’m not sure that’s enough,” Kara admits. On her face, Andrea can see her own future so clearly it almost has her flinch away: The pain, the heartbreak, the desperate yearning for something that might be lost forever.

“It’s more than enough. I know you save people every day, but believe me, it’s—”

Kara’s babyblues are full of hope, despite the tears welling in them, and Andrea’s voice gets stuck behind the lump in her throat. Maybe, by her own logic, if there is a coming back from their past for Kara and Lena, there might still be hope for her and Lena too? Maybe if she comes clean immediately this time. Maybe if she tells her everything.

But even as she entertains that tiny crumb of hope, rolls it around on her tongue to see how it tastes, part of her knows Lena rarely does second chances. She especially won’t do the same one twice. One more strike and Andrea is out for good.

“Kara? Can I ask you something?”

“Yeah?”

“If you could go back, would you… change anything?”

She isn’t even entirely sure what she is asking. Would Kara tell Lena sooner, if she had the chance? Would she reveal all of herself, no matter the consequences? Would she tell her about being Supergirl, even if that put Lena in danger? Would she kiss Lena on the mouth?

Andrea just has to know. The desire to know _everything_ burns in her veins and lights her up with the sudden intensity of a strong drink or a sharp blade pressed against her thigh.

“I… She deserved to know. I should have told her when we met. I don’t know why I didn’t.”

Andrea knows. She knows about keeping secrets. Secrets with the blasting power of a nuke. It’s about protecting the ones you love. And it’s about protecting yourself. Protecting that one thing that’s good and pure and whole in your life.

“You would tell her right off the bat?”

Kara lifts one shoulder and lets it drop. “Yeah. I knew she was a good person. That should have been enough.”

Kara’s words sink into her like fishhooks, pulling at those dark and heavy parts within her, reeling her in unexpectedly, and Andrea’s fingers tremble as she rubs her temples. Heat gathers in her cheeks. She swallows back her nerves and confusion, feeling them buzz and sting in her chest like a giant swarm of agitated wasps.

“I think you’re right,” she mumbles, watching her fingers pick at her cuticles like neither belong to her. It’s an old habit. Something she thought had died long ago. “But it’s not easy, is it?”

Kara sighs. “No. Trusting someone with… all that, it’s pretty scary, actually.” She takes a breath. Her eyes find Andrea’s, and Andrea can’t look away again. “And it’s okay to get scared, but… I shouldn’t have let that fear keep me from being honest. I know that now.” She takes a sip of her hot chocolate, smiles sadly. “Do you think Lena will ever forgive me?”

“I…”

Andrea is being pulled in two different directions at once. Part of her has to believe the answer to be a resounding ‘yes’, because if it isn’t, they’re both screwed, and Lena will be the one left to foot the bill, paying dearly for their mistakes. It would break her.

But there’s also a small, selfish part of her that wants the answer to be ‘no’, regardless of what that would mean.

She doesn’t want to hurt Lena and she doesn’t wish Kara ill. Kara is so honest and open, even when she doesn’t have to be. She is sweet and kind and trusting, but that’s also precisely the problem. Kara is everything she, Andrea, is not. Everything she will never be. Kara is all sugar and spice. How could anyone, how could Lena, not be drawn to that? How could it not be what’s best for her?

The right thing to do would be to help Kara and Lena fix what’s broken, then bow out gracefully. What Lena doesn’t know can’t hurt her, and with Andrea out of the picture, she can actually make sure it will never try again. She just has to let go. It’s what’s best for everyone. It’s the right decision, she knows it. It should be easy, even when it’s not.

Kara shifts in her seat, drawing Andrea’s eyes to the big ‘S’ on her chest, and breathing becomes something that’s no longer automatic or effortless.

Andrea feels the darkness slosh around in her belly. Before she knows what she’s doing, she has pushed back her chair and gotten to her feet. She feels Kara’s gaze trailing down her back as she puts her half-empty cup into the sink. She runs the tap, letting the cool water run over her wrists and into the cup, ruining the rest of her tea.

“Is everything okay? I didn’t mean to… upset you?”

Andrea’s heart is racing. The dangerous kind. The kind where black and white spots appear all around her and her hands get shaky. She turns around, leans against the counter, her fingers finding the edge and curling around it. As she stands there, everything goes a bit hazy, except for one thing: Kara’s knit eyebrows as she stares worriedly up at her.

She tries to smile. Claps spurs to her lips so they obey the command, even when her heart bucks and kicks her in the ribs. She doesn’t know what to say, or how to form the words to tell Kara about her… condition. She doesn’t know how to tell her what she needs to know in order to protect Lena when she, Andrea, no longer can.

“It doesn’t matter if she forgives me or not. The most important thing is that Lena is alright,” Kara says into the fizzling silence. “She didn’t want to… She wanted to go home; she wanted to be with you, and—”

Andrea’s legs tremble, her feet spasm, her hands shake. The ceiling light flickers for a long moment. Snarling shadows surround her until the light comes on again, and all Andrea wants to do is get out of the room and away from those impossibly bright and concerned eyes for a minute. She closes her eyes and forces air into her lungs, and when she opens them again, the light is steady but dimmed, and she is standing in the doorway between the kitchen and the hallway.

Kara looks shocked. She opens her mouth to speak, but Andrea stumbles forward and collapses back onto her chair before she can get a word out.

She leans on the table and drops her head into her hands, the tears threatening to overcome her. She can almost feel them rushing down her cheeks already, scalding and humiliating, as she listens to her deafening heartbeat drum in her ears.

“What… just… happened?”

“It’s… complicated.” Oh, not her parroting Lena’s favorite line like a complete idiot.

“Are you…? You know…?”

Andrea feels her face burn. She risks a glance through her fingers. Kara’s eyes are still alert, but she doesn’t look appalled. There’s no judgement or repulsion on her features.

“I’m… I’m not like you,” is all Andrea manages before her voice gives out and she goes back to hiding behind her hands. This is a disaster. And it’s her fault. It’s all her damn fault.

She needs to pull herself together and come up with a good explanation. She needs to take the last couple of minutes back. She is also very aware that she is completely unable to do any of those things. Her fingers are already wet from her ridiculous, inconvenient tears. Pressing her lips together, Andrea cusses at herself inside her head.

She doesn’t dare show her face again, not like this, not before her heart has calmed down. She tries to push her tears back, tries to breathe, tries to feel for the way her feet are warm in her comfy slippers. She listens for signs that Kara is no longer watching her, is no longer in the room with her, but the only thing Andrea finds is that she has never noticed how loud the clock on the wall is before this very moment in time, each passing second like a mocking metronome to whatever her heart is currently doing without her consent.

Something moves right next to her, startles her enough so she drops her hands and turns her head.

Andrea almost screams and falls off the chair, catching herself and the edge of the table at the very last moment. While she wasn’t looking, Kara has, apparently, pulled up a chair and sat down right next to her. So Andrea hasn’t been listening properly either. Great.

“Are you okay?” Kara asks tentatively. Her face looks the same up close— round, rosy, with impossibly blue and kind eyes. She looks concerned. “Is there anything I can do?”

Andrea can’t speak, she can barely shake her head. She doesn’t want to do that either; doesn’t want to acknowledge or admit a single thing, or name just one of the many emotions that are coursing through her body, her own vulnerability crawling up her spine and making her shudder.

“We can just sit too,” Kara offers. “Talk. Not talk. Whatever you want.” One of her hands lands on Andrea’s back, cautiously, lightly, like a question. Her touch is a warm patch right between her shoulder blades, and Andrea has to be careful she doesn’t crumple beneath it, but she also doesn’t want Kara to remove her hand. Maybe it’s okay right where it is. Maybe sitting is okay too.

“We… we mustn’t wake Lena,” she says finally. Her last therapist would have called her out on this, told her she is deflecting again, but she really _is_ worried about Lena right now.

“She’s okay. Her heart is okay,” Kara says after a quick moment, but with conviction. Andrea looks at her then, finding a soft smile. “Steady. Peaceful. She’s still asleep.”

“You… you can hear—?”

Kara taps her earlobe with a finger and nods, and Andrea feels the blush take over, her own heart tripping on her thoughts and stumbling around in her chest, trying to find its footing again.

“That’s… handy?”

Kara gives a small chuckle. “Also very loud.”

“I can imagine.” Andrea exhales, willing her stupid heart to hush and stop hitting the walls. “Earplugs probably don’t help?”

“Not really. My earrings do, but I’m glad I wasn’t wearing them tonight. I might have… missed Lena’s… I might not have heard her.”

Andrea blinks, digesting Kara’s complete lack of boundaries as well as the information. Kara is just telling her all this. Like it’s no big deal at all. Like she really does trust her and her word. Like she actually is a good person. The thought brings even more heat to her cheeks and has her vision go blurry.

“She called you?” She asks, carefully staying on the topic of Lena, but her voice cracks anyway.

“Not… specifically, no. I—” Kara’s hand travels to her shoulder, her arm sneaking around her with a reassuring squeeze, and Andrea stiffens. It’s all she can do to keep herself from shattering into an ugly mess right on the spot. She squeezes her eyes shut, lets herself tremble as she wanders through the untamed forest that is her emotions, dense with an impenetrable undergrowth of thorn-bushes, and so dark she’s getting lost in it. She stops; takes a deep, deep breath.

“I… I can move through shadows. Lena doesn’t know,” she whispers.

The tiny pieces of truth are out of her mouth before she can take them back, even when speaking them is like puking up glass. Her mind shuts off. She keeps her eyes closed. This goes against everything… everything that she— _oh God_. Andrea feels her chest go tight, her throat constrict with panic. Her lungs feel airtight. Her eyes sting. There’s a rushing noise in her ears. She has given up on telling her heart what _not_ to do.

“Do you know what happened to her mother?” She finds herself asking the question before she can think better of it. If Kara knows the answer, neither of them need the reminder. And if she doesn’t, it’s almost cruel to make her feel the same way Andrea does about Lena and what happened tonight.

“You mean her… actual mom? Not Lillian Luthor?” Kara asks carefully. “She died when Lena was little, didn’t she?”

“She drowned in a lake,” Andrea says, guilt prickling at the nape of her neck and crawling under her robe and shirt to needle at her skin. Lena will hate her for this. She will hate her for this too.

“Oh. That’s… I didn’t know that.” Kara sounds more sad than shocked, and Andrea is seized with the instant need to apologize. She can’t find those words, though, of course not. “Poor Lena. That’s terrible.”

Andrea thinks of Lena. Lena in the freezing cold water. She thinks of the woman in the red coat. She thinks of the small case sitting at the bottom of her closet, hidden behind a wall of neatly labeled boxes; of what’s lurking inside it and how it came to be there.

“I can’t tell Lena. She’s going to _hate_ me.”

“Lena’s not always the strongest advocate for what she needs,” Kara says, “but she’s smarter than that. She won’t hate you. You make her happy.”

Andrea hadn’t expected Kara to say much of anything in response. Let alone something like this, and in a tone of voice that’s both matter-of-fact and gentle enough to make her rub her eyes vigorously— before the tears get a chance to fall. 

“I don’t claim to know… or understand… everything, but I know you’re good for her.”

Andrea turns slightly to check out Kara’s face— for what it might tell her that her words aren’t— and she’s blushing. A pretty pink that goes from her throat to her nose. Her eyes seem even brighter, even bluer, like she hasn’t missed one hour of sleep tonight.

Andrea hasn’t gotten a minute of rest since Lena’s been gone. She’s exhausted.

“You should tell her. Waiting… doesn’t work,” Kara adds after a moment. There’s warmth and compassion in her gaze, and maybe a question or two burning away somewhere behind it, but Andrea can tell she won’t ask them now. Despite their late-night conversation and Kara’s arm around her shoulders, they aren’t actually that close. They aren’t friends. And discussing her relationship with Lena would take things one step too far. She has already said way too much.

Then her brain suddenly makes a connection, recalls a memory, and brings it to her attention and the forefront of her mind. A rush of heat hits her. She remembers how it felt to sit in that chair, with Lena draped prettily over her lap, and a pair of curious, inquisitive eyes following her every move. The thrill of it buzzes under her skin like an echo, and Andrea feels the heat of those very same eyes on her face.

The kitchen is silent and they are sitting so close— with barely a breath between their warm bodies, but neither of them moves away to get more space.

“She doesn’t hate you either,” Andrea mumbles. “I hope you know that.”

Lena doesn’t hate Kara. And maybe, just maybe, that means, whatever comes next, she won’t hate her either. Not really. Not forever. Andrea’s opinion of herself is an entirely different matter, of course, but she doesn’t have to talk about that with either of them. That she will keep to herself.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> After 3 a.m. kitchens are magical places. We all know it. ⭐️ ... Thoughts? ❤️
> 
>   
> (PS, all your comments are greatly appreciated! They make my day. It's been a crazy week and I haven't gotten to the last ones, but I've read them all and I will go back and reply asap. You guys are amazing!! Thank you!!) 
> 
> * * *
> 
> EDIT:
> 
> **Andrea <> English** in this chapter:
> 
>   * El Submarino — (the submarine) A sweet treat traditionally drunk in Argentina in winter. A bar of dark chocolate melted inside a glass of piping-hot milk and stirred with a long spoon until the chocolate is completely dissolved. Usually served in a tall glass with metal holder. 
> 



End file.
